Here are the facts.
After the Alpha, Beta, and Delta variants, another variant of concern had not been reported for some time. That changed on November 24th, 2021, when South Africa reported the variant to WHO. At the time, the President of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, said that preliminary data showed Omicron could be more transmissible than Delta.
From there, the country was red-listed to avoid the spread of the newest variant. However, it seems as though the world may have acted too late as Omicron already accounts for 3% of positive infections in the U.S, as reported by the CDC.
This rapid rise in cases confirms what scientists in South Africa had first revealed about the variant: it is highly infectious.
However, there’s also been data to show that Omicron is far milder than its predecessors, particularly Delta.
A study in South Africa, which examined 200,000 patients with COVID-19, found that those infected with the omicron variant were less likely to be hospitalized even if they had underlying conditions.
Yet, U.S. researchers say this data isn’t enough to predict how severe Omicron will be in America, as South Africa’s exposure to COVID differs significantly.
Although most of the African nation’s population is unvaccinated, there has been speculation that most of the country has been exposed to the virus and carries some level of immunity. This is substantiated by the number of excess deaths recorded during the pandemic.
The U.S. population doesn’t have this amount of exposure, even though more than half of the adult population is vaccinated. As a result, the latest variant will be closely monitored before our scientists can determine if Omicron is anything to worry about.