What Exactly is the Omicron Variant?
Mutations of a virus are inevitable. Omicron (B.1.1.529) is a new SARS-CoV-2 variant that was first reported to the World Health Organization on November 24 2021, raising alarms among researchers and the global community.
It was reported that Omicron came from South Africa. Today, the Omicron variant can also be found in Hong Kong, Australia, the United Kingdom, Germany, Israel, Italy, the Czech Republic, the United States and Canada. These are some of the countries that have recently confirmed cases of the Omicron variant.
How Dangerous is Omicron?
We are still in the early stages of learning about the Omicron variant and its potential impact on the world. The World Health Organization has classified Omicron as a Variant of Concern (VOC) due to having mutations known to display increased transmissibility, illness severity, or decreased effectiveness in diagnostics, vaccines, therapeutics and public health measures such as social distancing.
The number of rising Omicron cases across the globe suggests that it is highly infectious and highly transmissible. It hasn’t spread out of control yet, but we must work together to ensure Omicron doesn’t spread beyond our control.
Omicron is heavily mutated with 43 spike protein mutations compared to Delta’s 18.
Preliminary evidence also suggests that people who have been infected by Covid-19 could become reinfected easily with Omicron compared to other VOCs.
Currently, it is still unclear whether or not Omicron causes more severe symptoms compared to other variants. However, it seems that it may be milder than the Delta variant.
If Omicron continues to show signs that it’s milder in severity than Delta, that’s good news. That’s even better news if it spreads more quickly than the Delta variant. Why? Because when two variants of a virus are circulating, the variant that infects more people more quickly will tend to dominate, and it’s great if the milder one dominates.
Understanding the true level of severity of Omicron will likely take a couple more weeks.
