This variant of coronavirus was first reported this week in South Africa.
This Friday the World Health Organization (WHO) classified the variant B.1.1.529 of coronavirus as “worrying” and named it Omicron.
“Variant B.1.1.529 was first notified to WHO by South Africa on November 24, 2021 (…). This variant has a large number of mutations, some of which are worrisome, “said the group of experts commissioned by the WHO to follow the evolution of COVID-19.
The fear of this new highly contagious variant has led several countries to take measures now.
In Belgium, where the Belgian authorities announced that a case was detected. However, the Minister of Public Health, Frank Vandenbroucke, asked that “do not panic.”
The country announced that it will impose measures such as a mandatory 10-day quarantine for those who return from southern Africa and reside in Belgium, and an entry “ban” for non-residents, without specifying which countries will be affected, he explained.
In total, so far, cases of this variant have been confirmed in South Africa, Hong Kong (in a traveler from the African nation) and neighboring Botswana, as well as Israel.
B.1.1.529 has more than thirty mutations and some of them are, according to South African scientists, cause for concern due to its possible impact on transmissibility and its potential ability to evade immunity or previous protection.
Meanwhile, the United States indicated that it expects to have more scientific data on the new variant to make an “informed decision” on a possible border closure, the White House adviser on the pandemic said on Friday.
“We will make a decision as soon as possible, when we have more data” on the matter, Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser of the White House and director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of that country told CNN.
Fauci added that so far “there is no indication” that the new variant has been detected on US soil.
France, the Netherlands and Great Britain, among others, have already banned flights from South Africa and five neighboring countries as of noon this Friday. In Latin America, Guatemala did the same.
South African Health Minister Joe Phaahla said he sees the reaction applied to southern Africa in the form of restrictions as “unjustified”, “counterproductive” and “draconian”, given the little scientific information still available.
The minister argued his opinion on the fact that since the investigation is in a very preliminary phase because detection was announced early this week, there is no concrete scientific evidence that the new variant is more severe or transmissible (although there are indications that it could be more contagious due to the increase in cases in South Africa in recent days).
In addition, Phaala pointed out that, in fact, it is not “impossible” that the variant really has its origin in some other country that faces the pandemic in a “more liberal” way at the domestic level and recalled that the case this variant detected in Belgium (a woman who had traveled to Egypt via Turkey) has no known ties to southern Africa.
In this sense, he considered the wave of travel bans and international restrictions to be an “instinctive” and “draconian” response and pointed out that it is “ironic” that South Africa, whose number of new infections this Thursday stood at 2,465, is subject to restrictions by countries that are registering 40,000 or even 50,000 daily cases daily.
For his part, Professor Tulio de Oliveira, one of South Africa’s leading genomic surveillance specialists, also warned that drastic reactions may discourage other countries from sharing their information early out of fear.
The World Health Organization has so far issued recommendations in this direction, warning countries not to take travel restriction measures while the virulence and transmissibility of the new variant detected in South Africa remain unknown.
The concern is such that even oil prices fell more than 10% compared to the close of the day before, affected the threat that the discovery of a new variant of COVID-19 may pose to demand. (I)
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