Written By: Longjam Dineshwori | Updated : February 2, 2022 11:27 AM IST
डब्ल्यूएचओ के प्रमुख डॉ. टेड्रोस ए. घेब्रेयसस
The World Health Organisation (WHO) is tracking emerging COVID-19 variants, including the Omicron sub-lineage BA.2. The UN body has also warned that the virus is dangerous and as it continues to evolve, vaccines may need to evolve.
New SARS-CoV-2 variants may continue to escape neutralising antibodies induced by vaccines against prior variants, said WHO chief Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during an online briefing on Tuesday.
Tedros added that it is premature for any country either to surrender or to declare victory over the virus. He urged nations to continue testing, surveillance and sequencing.
"We are not calling for any country to return to so-called lockdown, but "we are calling on all countries to protect their people using every tool in the toolkit, not vaccines alone," he stated.
He also expressed concern that a narrative has taken hold in some countries that prevention is no longer necessary due to improved vaccination coverage and lower severity of Omicron. "Nothing could be further from the truth," he said, warning that the reservoir of beta coronaviruses is large and new mutations are likely.
Maria Van Kerkhove, COVID-19 Technical Lead at WHO, and WHO's emergencies chief Mike Ryan were also present during the online briefing. The experts spoke on various topics including rising number of COVID-related fatalities, emerging variants and the need to continue implementing COVID restrictions.
Watch the WHO media briefing on COVID-19 here:
Media briefing on #COVID19 with @DrTedroshttps://t.co/Av4gV9rpjt
World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) February 1, 2022
Kerkhove urged nations to go slow on relaxing COVID-related curbs as many countries are yet to reach Omicron-led COVID peak.
Further pointing out that many countries have low levels of vaccination coverage, the infectious disease epidemiologist cautioned that is not the time to lift everything all at once.
She reiterated that countries should be very cautious, in applying interventions as well as lifting those interventions in a steady and in a slow way, piece by piece because "this virus is quite dynamic."
Ryan, on the other hand, suggested that countries should not blindly follow others in relaxing measures, and instead chart their own path out of the pandemic, as not every country is in the same situation.
According to Tedros, the world is seeing a very worrying increase in deaths due to Omicron: Watch here
Since Omicron was first identified 10 weeks ago, almost 90 million #COVID19 cases have been reported to @WHO. We are now starting to see a very worrying increase in deaths, in most regions of the world. It's premature for any country either to surrender, or to declare victory. pic.twitter.com/mdFjaiv6sJ
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) February 1, 2022
A recent study led by Danish researchers has shown that the BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron is 1.5 times more transmissible than its original strain. The omicron variant, also referred to as B.1.1.529, has three main substrains: BA.1, BA.2, and BA.3.
The subvariant BA.2, which is also known as "Stealth Omicron", has spread to at least 55 countries, including India. Experts say that Stealth Omicron contains five unique mutations on a key part of the spike protein, which is often associated with higher transmissibility.
Meanwhile, a study from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has concluded that Omicron variant has dozens of mutations in the spike protein of the virus that help it to evade antibodies generated by COVID-19 vaccines or previous COVID infection, as well as antibodies produced by most of the current monoclonal antibody treatments.
Ram Sasisekharan, the Alfred H. Caspary Professor of Biological Engineering and Health Sciences and Technology (HST) at MIT.
However, vaccines still offer protection against severe illness, hospitalizations, and deaths due to infection with the Omicron variant, researchers stated.
With inputs from agencies
