So, Omricon update:
There was a massive spike of case counts in SA on Tuesday 11/23/21, which by now is almost a week ago.
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It's yet to be determined whether this variant is more severe (no evidence thus far) or how much more transmissible it is. It's too soon to call (certainly with my lack of expertise) but it's possible this could become the dominant strain globally like Delta has.
The case counts, severity and transmissibility of cases, and dominant strains are all important parameters to look at. But the current restrictions were introduced to allow time to collect enough data to analyze another parameter that you haven't mentioned,
which people are getting sick?As Abey has been hinting, this question is critical because the mutations are in the spike protein, which is used by the virus to infect our cells. It is also the protein that is targeted by most of our antibodies (induced by vaccination or prior infection) and by some of our treatments (convalescent serum, monoclonal antibodies). So unlike the many other variants that have been found, this variant may not be stopped by our current immunity, and may not be treatable with some of our current treatments.
To answer this question, we need to allow enough time to study the behavior of the virus and antibodies in the lab, and to analyze who is getting infected with this variant.
- Is it mostly those with no vaccination and no prior infection? If so, we can expect borders to re-open and to see renewed emphasis on vaccination.
-Is there a higher-than-expected percentage of vaccinated and/or recovered people getting omicron? If so, we can expect more prolonged restrictions to allow time (weeks? months?) for production of a new vaccine and development of new monoclonal antibodies.
One thing's for sure, the ship has sailed with cases reported across Europe, as well as in Canada and Australia.
Yes, borders today are quite porous, and omicron has moved far from its origin. But there's a difference between one ship that has sailed, and having an entire fleet enter the harbor every day. The restrictions were not placed in some naive belief that they will block every omicron virus, but simply as a measure to buy time for the scientific and medical research.