Covid-19: VOC Omicron alerts, pushes the world on edge
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: With the World Health Organization (WHO) naming the new and potentially the deadliest yet coronavirus variant as Omicron on Friday, governments rushed to contain the pandemic as they came on edge to face the new situation wherein the South African variant may replace Delta as the highest transmissible strain discovered so far.
They have also identified the variant in Botswana, Belgium, Hong Kong, and Israel.
At an emergency meeting in Geneva on Friday, the WHO classified the new SARS-CoV-2 variant (B.1.1.529) as a “Variant of Concern” (VOC) and named it Omicron, the 15th letter in the Greek alphabet, to make it identifiable.
Reports from Europe on Saturday, quoting the Dutch health officials, said dozens of people arriving in Amsterdam on two flights from South Africa on Friday could be infected. Officials are testing them to see if they carried the Omicron coronavirus variant.
Around 600 passengers arrived at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on the two KLM flights on Friday. They faced hours of delays and testing because of concerns over the new virus variant. Their initial testing found there could around 85 positive cases among the passengers.
On Friday, the Netherlands banned all air travel from southern Africa. Health Minister Hugo de Jonge said that passengers already en route to the Netherlands would have to undergo testing and quarantine upon arrival. Passengers on the two KLM flights, from Cape Town and Johannesburg, said they were kept waiting on the tarmac for hours. Authorities have closed night-time bars, restaurants, and most stores as they grapple with a record-breaking wave of Covid-19 cases that is swamping its healthcare system. The US had already advised its people not to travel to the Netherlands and Germany where, as in other European nations, infections have multiplied to thousands daily in recent days.
Meanwhile, the World Trade Organization (WTO) indefinitely postponed the ministerial-level meeting, scheduled from November 30 in Geneva, because of a fresh outbreak of the virus. No date has been set for the rescheduling of the 12th Ministerial Conference (MC). This is the second time that the pandemic has forced a postponement of the 12th Ministerial Conference. The meeting was originally due to take place in June 2020 in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.
The Omicron variant has also surprised pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer and BioNTech, who said they are “not sure” if their vaccines would work against the new Covid-19 variant but promised to develop a new vaccine against the strain within 100 days. They said they expected more data on Omicron within the next two weeks and had immediately started investigations on variant B.1.1.529.
“These data will provide more information about whether B.1.1.529 could be an escape variant that may require an adjustment of our vaccine if the variant spreads globally,” it added. “In the event that vaccine-escape variant emerges, Pfizer and BioNTech expect to be able to develop and produce a tailor-made vaccine against that variant in approximately 100 days, subject to regulatory approval.”
Another US drug major, Moderna, said on Friday it will develop a booster shot against the new Omicron variant. It is one of three strategies the company is working to address the new threat, including a higher dose of its existing vaccine.
The deadly Omicron has triggered alarm across the world. Britain, the US, and Canada banned flights from South African nations while Japan, Israel, Turkey, Switzerland, and the United Arab Emirates toughened travel curbs.
In India, the government has instructed the states to ensure ‘rigorous screening and testing of all international travelers landing in India from ‘at-risk’ countries. These nations include the UK, South Africa, Brazil, Bangladesh, Botswana, China, Mauritius, New Zealand, Zimbabwe, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Israel.
So far, no case of the new Covid-19 variant has been reported in India.
On Saturday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi directed government officials to review plans to ease international travel restrictions in light of the new VOC. In a two-hour-long meeting, he stressed monitoring all international arrivals and testing as per guidelines, focusing specifically on countries identified as ‘at-risk’.
He also directed them to increase the second dose of Covid-19 vaccine coverage and step up genome sequencing of samples collected from international travelers and the community, and make it more broad-based.
The Centre has instructed officials to coordinate with the states and union territories to ensure that they had adequate stocks of medicines and their medical infrastructure stayed ready.
In view of India experiencing an oxygen crisis during the second wave of the pandemic earlier this year, the government has directed officials to coordinate with the states to ensure the proper functioning of PSA oxygen plants and ventilators.
Modi asked officials to be proactive and said that people must remain more cautious and follow precautions such as masking and social distancing. Intensive containment and active surveillance should continue in clusters reporting higher cases and required technical support be provided to states reporting higher cases.
On Friday, the WHO said about Omicron: “This variant has a large number of mutations, some of which are concerning. Preliminary evidence suggests an increased risk of reinfection with this variant, as compared to other VOCs. The number of cases of this variant appears to be increasing in almost all provinces in South Africa,” it said, echoing the observations made the world over.
The B.1.1.529 variant was first reported to WHO from South Africa on November 24, 2021. “The epidemiological situation in South Africa has been characterized by three distinct peaks in reported cases, the latest of which was predominantly the Delta variant. In recent weeks, infections have increased steeply, coinciding with the detection of B.1.1.529 variant. The first known confirmed B.1.1.529 infection was from a specimen collected on 9 November 2021, the WHO said.
The WHO urged the countries to enhance surveillance and sequencing efforts to better understand circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants. They should submit complete genome sequences and associated metadata to a publicly available database, such as GISAID, and report initial cases/clusters associated with VOC infection to WHO through the IHR mechanism. In coordination with the international community, they could perform field investigations and laboratory assessments to improve understanding of the potential effects of the VOC on Covid-19 epidemiology, severity, the effectiveness of public health and social measures, diagnostic methods, immune responses, antibody neutralization, or other relevant characteristics.
