Tag: OMICRON

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-Top News UK News

UK govt nod for vaccine targeting Omicron

Moderna’s chief medical officer, Dr Paul Burton, previously said that the new jab can boost a person’s antibodies to such high levels that it may only be needed annually…reports Asian Lite News

Britain has become the first country to approve a new Covid jab specifically targeting the Omicron variant, Daily Mirror reported.

The “next generation” coronavirus booster jab may only need administering once a year and has been approved for use in adults.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has authorised Moderna’s bivalent vaccine, which targets the original Covid strain and the Omicron variant, Daily Mirror reported.

Known as mRNA-1273.214, the dose is an updated version of the Moderna vaccine which is already in use for first, second and booster doses, and it will be the first dose approved in the UK which targets two strains of the virus.

Moderna’s chief medical officer, Dr Paul Burton, previously said that the new jab can boost a person’s antibodies to such high levels that it may only be needed annually, Daily Mirror reported.

Stephane Bancel, chief executive officer at Moderna, described it as a “next generation Covid -19 vaccine” which will play an “important role in protecting people in the UK from Covid-19” over the winter.

Bancel said: “We are delighted with the MHRA’s authorisation of Spikevax Bivalent Original/Omicron, our next generation Covid-19 vaccine.

“This represents the first authorisation of an Omicron-containing bivalent vaccine, further highlighting the dedication and leadership of the UK public health authorities in helping to end the Covid-19 pandemic”.

Bancel added that the jab has “consistently shown superior breadth of immune response” over alternatives in clinical trials.

The MHRA said that the vaccine’s side effects are the same as those seen in the original Moderna booster dose and were typically mild.

ALSO READ-BA.5 Omicron subvariant now dominant in US

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News

‘Half of Canadians infected with Omicron in five months’


The highest level of infection was found in young adults aged 17 to 24, based off of donations made to Canadian Blood Services…reports Asian Lite News

Half of the Canadian population, or more than 17 million people, were infected with Omicron in only five months starting December 2021, local media has reported.

The media outlet quoted a report by the Covid-19 Immunity Task Force (CITF) showing that prior to Omicron, just 7 per cent of Canadians had antibodies from being infected by the virus. The proportion rose by 45 per cent from December 2021 to May 2022, Xinhua news agency reported, reffering to National Post.

According to the report, this increase is equivalent to more than 100,000 infections per day, which is more than 10 times the number of daily cases seen during previous peaks of SARS-CoV-2 waves over the last two years.

The highest level of infection was found in young adults aged 17 to 24, based off of donations made to Canadian Blood Services. A total of 65 per cent of them had antibodies at the end of May, the report revealed.

The results are based on population seropositivity, or “the proportion of people with antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in their blood”, the report explained, adding that the research differentiated between antibodies that occurred naturally as a reaction to being infected by the virus and antibodies created by the vaccine. They were thus able to determine which antibodies were a sign of past infection “to track the magnitude of the Omicron wave”.

“Omicron has been a tsunami,” CITF Executive Director Tim Evans was quoted as saying. He said that new sublineages of the virus have been spreading since then, pushing the percentage of Canadians who have been infected “well above” 50 percent.

“Millions of Canadians now have hybrid immunity from a combination of Covid-19 vaccines and an infection,” said CITF Co-Chair David Naylor.

“Unfortunately, emerging evidence suggests that most of these individuals remain at risk of re-infection with viruses in the Omicron lineage,” Naylor was quoted by the National Post.

On April 23, 2020, the Canadian government launched CITF with a mandate to catalyse, support, fund and harmonise knowledge on SARS-CoV-2 immunity for federal, provincial, and territorial decision-makers in their efforts to protect Canadians and minimise the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

ALSO READ-Expert alarms presence of new Omicron sub-variant in India

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-Top News COVID-19

Expert alarms presence of new Omicron sub-variant in India

The sub-variant is worth “keeping a close eye” on, Thomas Peacock, a scientist at Imperial College London, said on Twitter…reports Asian Lite News

About 10 states in India have detected a new sub-variant of Omicron BA.2.75, which may be “alarming” in nature, according to an Israeli expert on Sunday.

However, the Indian Health Ministry is yet to officially confirm the detection of the sub-variant in the country.

In a series of Tweets, Dr. Shay Fleishon, with the Central Virology Laboratory at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer, said that 85 sequences from eight countries have been uploaded so far on Nextstrain, an open-source platform of genomic data.

This included 69 from India: Delhi (1), Haryana (6), Himachal Pradesh (3), Jammu (1), Karnataka (10), Madhya Pradesh (5), Maharashtra (27), Telangana (2), Uttar Pradesh (1), and West Bengal (13).

Besides India, the strain has also been reported by seven other countries: Japan (1), Germany (2), the UK (6), Canada (2), the US (2), Australia (1), and New Zealand (2), according to the Nextstrain data.

“No transmission could be tracked based on sequences outside India yet,” Fleishon wrote on Twitter.

While he said it is “too soon to tell” whether BA.2.75 will be the next dominant variant, he noted that the sub-variant may be “alarming because it may imply a trend to come”.

Fleishon explained that in recent months, there has been a trend of second generation variants based on Omicron sub-lineages, namely BA.1, BA.2, BA.3, BA.4, and BA.5.

This was based on Omicron lineages with mutations in the S1 section of the spike protein and specifically in the part of the spike protein which the virus uses to connect to and gain entry into cells.

However, the rise seen in these sub-variants has been “at a level not seen in second-generation variants from other variants of concerns”.

Further, until now these second-generation variants have only been found in a few cases within one region. This is the first time a second-generation variant from Omicron has spread to multiple regions.

“The fact that such a divergent 2nd gen variant can succeed inter-host is alarming. It means that if BA.2.75 will not succeed, and even if it will, other 2nd gen might grow better over time,” Fleishon said.

The sub-variant is worth “keeping a close eye” on, Thomas Peacock, a scientist at Imperial College London, said on Twitter.

The BA.2.75 was also flagged by Bloom Lab at the Fred Hutch research institute in the US.

In a tweet, posted this week, the institute said the sub-variant “is worth tracking, as it has appreciable antigenic change relative to its parent BA.2”.

The lab pointed to two mutations as key: G446S and R493Q.

“G446S is at one of most potent sites of escape from antibodies elicited by current vaccines that still neutralises BA.2. So for immunity from vaccines or early infections, adding G446S to BA.2 will decrease neutralisation,” the lab said.

“However, G446S will have less effect on antibodies of people with prior BA.1 breakthrough infection. Therefore, BA.2.75’s antigenic advantage relative to BA.2 will be most pronounced in people who have not had BA.1 exposure,” it said.

This means that “BA.2.75 will have antibody escape that is similar to that for BA.4/5 with respect to the current vaccine”.

The R493Q mutation, on the other hand, seems to increase the virus’s ability to attach to ACE2 — the protein which the Covid virus uses to enter cells.

ALSO READ-Omicron variants: US FDA backs Covid boosters

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-Top News COVID-19

Fresh concern over 2 Omicron variants, surge in UK Covid cases

Israel detects 20 cases of Omicron sub-variant

The country dropped nearly all of its Covid restrictions months ago. Apart from the Omicron variant – that took hold of the UK towards the end of 2021…reports Asian Lite News

Scientists in Britain have warned of another fresh Covid wave as the United Kingdom logged over 15,800 new cases on Tuesday. Last week, British health officials also expressed concerns that there were “early signs the country could be at the start of a new wave of infections driven by Omicron variants,” news agency AP reported Tuesday. The new BA.4 and BA.5 strains of the Omicron variant are said to be closer to the earlier, ‘more dangerous’ Alpha and Delta variants as against the highly transmissible but milder Omicron, The Independent, a UK media outlet, reported, citing experts.

Although hospitalisation rates have so far remained “very low,” UK’s fresh infections have been hovering above the 10,000-mark since June 12. In the week ending June 19, the UK recorded a 43 per cent increase in its fresh cases, AP reported. In a period of ten days (from June 12 to 21) the UK has recorded over 1.24 lakh new infections. This as the number of fresh cases globally went down by 3 per cent as per World Health Organisation. “There were 3.3 million new Covid-19 infections last week, marking a 4 per cent decrease, with more than 7,500 deaths. But cases jumped by about 6 per cent in Europe,” the global health body was quoted as saying.

The country dropped nearly all of its Covid restrictions months ago. Apart from the Omicron variant – that took hold of the UK towards the end of 2021, the experts are also attributing the spike to street parties, concerts and other festivities celebrating Queen Elizabeth II’s platinum jubilee earlier this month.

Elsewhere in Europe, France is already facing a new wave of Covid-19 infections fuelled by new variants of the disease, French vaccination chief Alain Fischer said as per Reuters, as daily new cases reached an almost two-month peak at more than 95,000 infections on Tuesday.

ALSO READ-US facing double whammy: Omicron variants & fuel price

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-Top News COVID-19

New Omicron subvariant makes up 60% of new Covid cases

The new version evolved from BA.2, which was more contagious than any previous coronavirus variant…reports Asian Lite News

A new Omicron subvariant made up nearly 60 per cent of all new US cases in the latest week, according to estimates released by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The new subvariant, known as BA.2.12.1, spreads more rapidly than previous versions of Omicron, Xinhua news agency reported.

It only made up about 3.4 per cent of new Covid-19 cases in the country in late March. The data increased to 31.8 per cent at the end of April, and 59.1 per cent the end of May, CDC data showed on Tuesday.

The new version evolved from BA.2, which was more contagious than any previous coronavirus variant.

The US is averaging more than 100,000 new confirmed cases per day, according to CDC data.

Health experts are predicting sharp rise of new infections after Memorial Day weekend travels and gatherings.

Memorial Day surge expected

As the United States marked the Memorial Day and celebrates the unofficial start of summer, the seven-day average for Covid-19 cases in the country is more than six times what it was a year ago.

The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported a seven-day average of 119,725 Covid-19 cases as of Saturday. That figure held at 17,887 cases on May 28, 2021, Xinhua news agency reported.

During the three-day holiday weekend, one of the country’s traditionally busiest travel periods, more than 39 million Americans are expected to take to the skies and roads, according to estimates by the American Automobile Association.

Experts are predicting a sharp rise in new infections after Memorial Day weekend travels and gatherings.

In recent weeks, confirmed daily cases in the US have been rising again, powered by a rising tide of Omicron subvariants currently circulating the country.

The US is averaging about 110,000 new cases each day, according to data of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Experts believe the real count of cases is much higher as many were underreported due to at-home Covid-19 tests.

While new deaths are relatively low, the total known US deaths from Covid-19 recently surpassed 1 million.

The Omicron subvariants are spreading rapidly across the US as many of the country’s pandemic restrictions have been lifted.

Health officials said the US is in the midst of yet another COVID-19 wave. They have warned Americans to exercise caution ahead of a possible surge.

“Anyone who has not been boosted for their vaccinations should really start thinking about those boosters right now,” said Jill Roberts, Associate professor for the University of South Florida College of Public Health.

Health officials have urged people to take precautions to help limit the spread during Memorial Day holidays, wearing masks when inside public spaces and practicing social distancing.

“The one tool that a lot of us have not been doing anymore is really distancing,” Roberts added.

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COVID-19 World

New Zealand reports 1st Omicron BA.5 variant

New Zealand reports 1st Omicron BA.5 variant

New Zealand reported its first case of Omicron BA.5 variant at the border, said the Ministry of Health in a statement on Sunday…reports Asian Lite News

A person who has travelled from South Africa to New Zealand has been confirmed as having the BA.5 variant of Omicron, reports Xinhua news agency.

This is the first known detection of the variant in New Zealand.

According to the Ministry, this follows the detection of BA.4 on May 1, also in a person who had travelled from South Africa.

It can take weeks or months to assess the severity of each new variant or sub-variant, so the Ministry of Health will continue to monitor the emerging evidence closely.

Microbiologist Associate Professor Siouxsie Wiles from the University of Auckland was worried about “all versions of Omicron around” and “variants of the virus we don’t yet know about but are almost certainly out there evolving away”.

“One big problem with the ‘getting back to normal’ phase that most countries have adopted is putting immunocompromised people at high risk of infection. While this is dangerous for their health, it can also be really bad for everyone else,” Wiles told local media.

New Zealand is currently under the orange settings of the Covid-19 Protection Framework, where there is no limit for gatherings.

University of Otago epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker told local media that most infectious diseases don’t decline in severity over time.

“If we look at Omicron now, its severity is very similar to the original Covid-19 virus that we saw for a whole year, and it’s still about 10 times more dangerous than influenza for unimmunized people,” said Baker.

According to the Mnistry, Sunday’s seven-day rolling average of community case numbers is 7,510, even a little bit higher than last the 7,414 reported cases on May 1.

“Unfortunately, we’re now seeing the (infection) rates in New Zealand plateauing out, and we’re seeing this, particularly in Auckland, because that was the first place to get a peak,” said Baker.

ALSO READ: Global Covid caseload tops 517.3 mn

Immunologist Anna Brooks from the University of Auckland told local news that New Zealand is facing a huge number of long Covid-19 cases in the aftermath of Omicron.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has been in self-isolation after her fiancee Clarke Gayford tested positive for the virus.

Ardern announced the news on Sunday morning via social media.

Meanwhile, the country has reported 989,946 confirmed cases of Covid-19 since the beginning of the pandemic, with 810 deaths.

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-Top News Australia COVID-19

Omicron sub-variant detected in Australia

Health authorities of Australia’s Victoria state confirmed that the Omicron sub-variant BA.2.12.1 has been traced in wastewater in Melbourne…reports Asian Lite News

The Victoria Health Department said authorities would now prioritize the sequencing of PCR samples from Covid-19 cases in the water catchment area to get a better understanding of the spread of the BA.2.12.1, reports Xinhua news agency.

“Early evidence suggests it is more transmissible than BA.2 but does not cause more severe disease.”

The BA.2.12.1 sub-variant is currently on the rise in the US, which makes up nearly 30 per cent of sequences identified nationally, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and is also fast spreading through Europe.

Victoria reported 19 Covid deaths on Saturday along with 9,064 new cases, bringing the state’s overall active cases to 54,992.

There are 448 people hospitalised with Covid in the state, 30 of whom are in intensive care units.

The BA.2.12.1 detection came only a day after the first case of another Omicron sub-variant, BA.4, was found in the neighbouring state of New South Wales (NSW) in traveller from South Africa.

The sudden simultaneous arrival of the two virulent strains is already causing concern among medical experts such as epidemiologist Professor Adrian Esterman from the University of South Australia.

ALSO READ: Global Covid caseload tops 512.2 mn

“BA.2.12.1 now accounts for 25 percent of cases in the U.S. BA.4 is rapidly becoming the dominant strain in South Africa. Increasing case numbers will inevitably result in increased hospitalizations and more people with long-Covid. This is real and happening now,” Esterman tweeted.

Speaking to local media, Esterman said BA.4 “appears to escape the immune system a bit better than BA.2, so that means that people who’ve already been infected can be re-infected more easily, and people who are vaccinated can be infected more easily”.

“This comes just at the stage where we’re removing all our public health measures – that’s the bad news,” he said.

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Africa News COVID-19 News

South Africa confirms two Omicron sublineages

South Africa confirms two Omicron sublineages

South Africa’s National Department of Health confirmed that Omicron sublineages BA.4 and BA.5 exist in the country…reports Asian Lite News

“There are 5 sub-variants of Omicron being observed around the world. We are watching two — BA.4 and BA.5,” the Department’s spokesperson Foster Mohale told Xinhua.

Mohale said the BA.4 subvariant’s dominance has not caused severe transmission, Xinhua news agency reported.

“The dominance of BA.4 has not resulted in a change in transmission rate or severity. These sub-variants are not causing nor are they going to cause the 5th wave,” he said.

The department said that it was expecting the fifth wave of the pandemic by the end of May.

Professor Tulio de Oliveira of the University of KwaZulu-Natal also talked about the new subvariants but said no cause for concern.

“New Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 detected in South Africa, Botswana, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, and the UK. Early indications that these new sublineages are increasing as a share of genomically confirmed cases in SA. No cause for alarm as no major spike in cases, admissions or deaths in SA,” he tweeted.

Infectious disease epidemiologist Abdul Karim told SAfm Radio that the variant that would replace the Omicron would spread much more quickly. There was no way to predict whether the new variant would be severe or mild.

ALSO READ: Back to normal in South Africa

“Each new variant has been able to spread faster than the one before it,” he said.

As a result of the Beta and Delta variants, the second and third waves in South Africa were more severe, while the fourth wave associated with an Omicron variant had fewer hospitalizations and deaths.

The National Institute for Communicable Diseases said Tuesday that South Africa detected 1,291 new Covid cases in the last 24 hours which represented a 5.6 per cent positivity rate. There were two deaths over the same period, which brought the total fatalities to 100,116.

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COVID-19 India News

Delta variant completely replaced by Omicron in TN

Fresh Covid cases are on a decline in Tamil Nadu with the state reporting only 33 new cases. Of the 38 districts in the state, 26 reported no new Covid cases on Monday…reports Asian Lite News

The Tamil Nadu Directorate of Public health in a statement said that the Delta variant of Covid-19 is now totally replaced by the Omicron variant in the state.

The report of the state public health department said that 68.4 per cent of all whole-genome sequenced samples were of the BA.2 variant while 15.2 per cent were of the BA.1.1 variant.

The other variants are BA.1 (10.3 per cent ), B.1.1.529 (6 per cent), and BA.3 (0.05 per cent). The whole-genome sequenced samples did not have any Delta variant, the statement said.

Interestingly in January 2022, while the Omicron variant represented 92 per cent of the samples, 4 per cent were of Delta and the rest were of other variants.

The state public health department also said that Tamil Nadu will continue with its surveillance and added that in Europe and the US, the BA.2 variant led to the surge in Covid cases and, hence, called upon the people not to lower their guards.

Fresh Covid cases are on a decline in Tamil Nadu with the state reporting only 33 new cases. Of the 38 districts in the state, 26 reported no new Covid cases on Monday.

Tamil Nadu health minister Ma Subramanian while speaking to IANS said, “Even as there is no need to panic on the high incidences of BA.2 variant of Covid-19 in samples tested, we have directed all the district collectors to be on guard and to strictly monitor the situation in their respective districts in association with the district health officials and the district police authorities.”

On Monday, according to the public health department, the state tested 28,916 samples and only 33 cases were reported positive for Covid. The Test Positivity Rate (TPR) was 0.1 per cent.

The Tamil Nadu health secretary, J. Radhakrishnan while speaking to IANS said, “Chennai, Vellore, and Chengalpattu have been showing variations even as there is a slump in the overall cases. Chennai district had recorded 19 positive cases on Sunday while it was only 12 on Saturday but the figures have again come down to 16 on Monday.”

He said that all the district collectors have been given an alert to review minor increases and the fluctuating number of fresh cases in certain districts, including Chennai.

ALSO READ-Britain reports Delta x Omicron combine variant

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-Top News COVID-19 Europe

Omicron subvariant casts shadow over easing curbs in Europe

The EMA called non-vaccinated citizens to get jabbed as soon as possible, emphasizing that there are now five Covid-19 jabs authorised in the EU using different technologies….reports Asian Lite News

Cases of Omicron BA2, a Covid-19 subvariant, are rising across the European Union (EU) as member nations were lifting restrictions, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) said.

“While many EU countries are lifting restrictions, we notice that the infection rates are increasing again in some member states, partly because of the circulation of Omicron BA2, which seems to be more transmissible than other variants,” Xinhua news agency quoted Marco Cavalieri, head of the EMA’s strategy on biological health threats and vaccines, as saying to journalists here on Thursday.

What matters the most, he said, is how this increase in cases will stress the healthcare systems.

The EMA called non-vaccinated citizens to get jabbed as soon as possible, emphasizing that there are now five Covid-19 jabs authorised in the EU using different technologies.

“There is currently no evidence that immune response after vaccination is significantly different with Omicron BA2. Vaccines continue to offer high protection against hospitalization and death,” he said.

The vaccines that have received conditional marketing authorisation from the EMA are those produced by Pfizer/BioNtech, Moderna, AstraZeneca, Janssen and Novavax.

ALSO READ: More contagious version of Omicron spreads in US