Dec. 2, 2021 -- South Africa’s COVID-19 cases astir doubled wrong 24 hours, jumping from a reported 4,300 caller cases connected Tuesday to 8,500 caller regular cases connected Wednesday, according to the BBC.
Health officials person confirmed that the caller Omicron variant has go the ascendant coronavirus strain successful South Africa and is driving a crisp summation successful caller infections.
“There is simply a anticipation that really, we’re going to beryllium seeing a superior doubling oregon tripling of the cases arsenic we determination on oregon arsenic the week unfolds,” Nicksy Gumede-Moeletsi, PhD, a determination virologist for the World Health Organization, told The Associated Press.
“There is simply a anticipation that we are going to spot a immense summation successful the fig of cases being identified successful South Africa,” she said.
In aboriginal November, the state reported 200 to 300 caller cases per time and had a 1% positivity rate. But cases began to summation rapidly successful mid-November, and Wednesday’s positivity complaint reached 16.5%, the AP reported.
South Africa was the archetypal state to observe the caller Omicron variant and study it to the WHO. The country’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases said Wednesday that 74% of the microorganism genomes sequenced successful November person been of the caller variant, the BBC reported.
As of Thursday morning, 25 countries person reported 329 cases of the Omicron variant to GISAID, a planetary database for genomic sequencing. The latest countries to corroborate their archetypal cases see the U.S., India, and Ghana.
Hospitalizations are expanding successful South Africa but not astatine the complaint of the caller cases. So far, infirmary admissions are pursuing the aforesaid inclination arsenic erstwhile COVID-19 surges successful the country, according to an investigation by the Financial Times.
Scientists person expressed concerns astir the ample fig of mutations connected the Omicron variant, though they can’t rather accidental whether the variant is much transmissible, causes much terrible COVID-19, oregon evades vaccines. Labs successful South Africa are focusing connected genomic sequencing of Omicron cases to reply those questions.
“The satellite is watching South Africa,” Deenan Pillay, PhD, a prof of virology astatine University College London, told the Financial Times.
“There are a batch of things we don’t cognize astir Omicron,” helium said. “Real satellite objective information from South Africa volition supply america with immoderate of the archetypal answers.”
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