More dangerous variants could emerge from soaring Omicron cases, says WHO

‘We are in very dangerous phase,’ says WHO senior emergencies officer Dr Catherine Smallwood

Alisha Rahaman Sarkar
Wednesday 05 January 2022 11:49 GMT
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Omicron variant spreading rapidly

The spread of Covid-19 cases related to the Omicron variant of the coronavirus could lead to the emergence of new and more dangerous variants, a World Health Organisation official has warned.

“The more Omicron spreads, the more it transmits and the more it replicates, the more likely it is to throw out a new variant,” WHO senior emergencies officer Catherine Smallwood said on Tuesday.

Since the highly-contagious variant was first detected in November, it has emerged in at least 128 countries.

“Omicron is lethal, it can cause death ... Maybe a little bit less than Delta, but who is to say what the next variant might throw out,” Dr Smallwood told AFP.

She added that Europe has reported more than five million new cases just in the last week of 2021, “almost dwarfing what we have seen in the past”.

“We are in a very dangerous phase, we are seeing infection rates rise very significantly in Western Europe, and the full impact of that is not yet clear,” she cautioned.

The UK recorded 218,724 cases for the first time on Tuesday, while France reported a high of 271,000 cases as the variant batters Europe. The Omicron variant has forced countries to reimpose lockdown and travel restrictions.

The United States reported nearly one million new coronavirus infections on Monday, the highest one day tally of any country in the world. Omicron accounted for 95 per cent of new Covid-19 infections last week in the US, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.

Though the variant spreads at an unprecedented rate across the globe, Omicron is believed to cause milder symptoms.

“We are seeing more and more studies pointing out that Omicron is infecting the upper part of the body. Unlike the other ones that could cause severe pneumonia,” WHO incident manager Abdi Mahamud said at a media briefing in Geneva on Tuesday. “It can be good news, but we really require more studies to prove that.”

While cases have surged to all-time records, hospitalisation and death rates are comparatively lower, for now, in most parts. “What we are seeing now is....the decoupling between the cases and the deaths,” Mr Mahamud said.

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