Re: Socialist Demands for the COVID-19 Crisis
Posted: Mon Nov 29, 2021 3:03 pm
COVID: Unclear if Variant Omicron More Transmissible or Severe
A man wearing a face mask walks past a bus in London, Britain, on Nov. 24, 2021. | Photo: Xinhua
Published 28 November 2021 (16 hours 22 minutes ago)
All variants of COVID-19, including the Delta variant that is currently dominant worldwide, can cause severe disease or death, in particular for the most vulnerable people, and thus prevention is always key.
It is not yet clear whether the Omicron COVID-19 variant is more transmissible, or causes more severe disease compared to other variants including Delta, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Sunday.
WHO said it's not yet clear whether Omicron is more easily spread from person to person compared to other variants, even though the number of people testing positive has risen in South Africa where this variant was involved.
It's also not yet clear whether Omicron causes more severe disease, but preliminary data suggests that there are increasing rates of hospitalization in South Africa, which however may be due to increasing overall numbers of people becoming infected.
WHO confirmed that there is currently no information to suggest that symptoms associated with Omicron are different from those from other variants, as understanding the level of severity of the Omicron variant will take days to several weeks.
All variants of COVID-19, including the Delta variant that is currently dominant worldwide, can cause severe disease or death, in particular for the most vulnerable people, and thus prevention is always key.
However, WHO said preliminary evidence suggests there may be an increased risk of reinfection with Omicron, but information is limited. More information on this will become available in the coming days and weeks.
It added that current PCR tests continue to detect Omicron, while further studies are still going on to understand how the Omicron variant will impact on available vaccines and treatments to COVID-19.
WHO classified on Friday the latest variant B.1.1.529 of SARS-CoV-2 virus, now with the name Omicron, as a "Variant of Concern" (VOC).
According to WHO's definition, a VOC, with a degree of global public health significance, demonstrates one or more of mutational changes, such as increase in transmissibility or detrimental change in COVID-19 epidemiology, increase in virulence or change in clinical disease presentation, and decrease in effectiveness of public health and social measures or available diagnostics, vaccines, therapeutics.
WHO has since called on countries to enhance surveillance and sequencing on circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants, submit complete genome sequences and metadata to a publicly available database, and report initial VOC cases or clusters to WHO.
It has also recommended field investigations and laboratory assessments to better understand potential impacts of the VOC on COVID-19 epidemiology, the effectiveness of public health and social measures and antibody neutralization.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/COV ... -0007.html
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US Scrambles To Take Actions Over Omicron's Chilling Effect
Tourist area in New York, U.S., Nov. 28, 2021. | Photo: Twitter/ @rupinder_hardy
Published 29 November 2021 (30 minutes ago)
President Biden announced his country will impose travel restrictions on eight African countries including South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi.
The newly-discovered Omicron variant of COVID-19 in South Africa has raised fears about the global trajectory of the pandemic, while some countries including the United States have raced to impose travel restrictions on southern African countries.
On Friday, U.S. President Joe Biden announced that his country will impose travel restrictions on eight African countries including South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi. Except for this "precautionary" measure, Biden again urged Americans and people around the world to get vaccinated against the virus.
Australia and Japan are also among the latest nations on Saturday to either halt flights to the region or announce mandatory quarantines and screenings. The World Health Organization (WHO) said there was preliminary evidence that the Omicron variant was more transmissible than the Delta one. Meanwhile, Belgium, Israel and Botswana also detected first cases of the new variant.
"Although scientists were still figuring out the exact effects of the variant's many mutations, its discovery highlights the continued threat posed by an evolving virus to the world's emergence from the pandemic," reported The Wall Street Journal on Friday.
U.S. officials have spoken with scientists and leaders in South Africa to learn more about Omicron. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that Omicron hadn't been identified in the United States.
The WHO labeled Omicron a "variant of concern," a designation given to variants like Delta that require close scrutiny from public health officials. Preliminary evidence suggested that Omicron may increase the risk of reinfection relative to other variants of concern. South African researchers identified the first Omicron case on Nov. 9, then reported the variant to the WHO on Wednesday. Scientists are hopeful that they spotted the variant early, since the majority of known cases are still concentrated in southern Africa.
"Scientists are still waiting on lab studies to determine how well coronavirus antibodies -- either from natural infection or vaccines -- hold up against Omicron. They're also watching carefully to see how quickly the variant spreads across the globe, particularly in countries with higher vaccination rates," reported Business Insider on Saturday.
Moderna, BioNTech-Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson all said that they're testing how well their vaccines protect against Omicron. Merck said in a final analysis of a clinical trial, its antiviral pill reduced the risk of hospitalization and death among high-risk COVID-19 patients by 30 percent, down from an earlier estimate of 50 percent.
"News of the Omicron variant, which has an unusually high number of mutations, will certainly throw a spanner in the works for the Biden administration as the president struggles with flagging approval ratings and a pessimistic view of the economy," reported CNN on Friday. "The administration will need to work quickly to get ahead of the new variant."
The pandemic is far from over, and after nearly two years and more than 775,000 deaths, many Americans are traumatized and on edge, said the television network, adding that with the variants stymying hopes of a full recovery, "it has become increasingly difficult to embrace any good news, as fear and uncertainty continue to dictate so much of our lives.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US- ... -0003.html
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Expert: China capable of dealing with new variant
By Zhou Wenting in Shanghai | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2021-11-28 16:40
A healthcare worker conducts a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) COVID-19 test on a traveler at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg on November 27, 2021, after several countries banned flights from South Africa following the discovery of a new COVID-19 variant Omicron. A flurry of countries around the world have banned ban flights from southern Africa following the discovery of the variant, including the United States, Canada, Australia,Thailand, Brazil and several European countries. [Photo/Agencies]
The new COVID-19 variant Omicron, which the World Health Organization has termed a "variant of concern" and is more transmissible than the dominant Delta strain, will not have a major influence on China at the current phase, Zhang Wenhong, a Shanghai doctor widely known for his pandemic fight, wrote on his Sina Weibo on Sunday.
"China's current strategies of rapid response and dynamically zeroing cases will be able to cope with various types of variants of the novel coronavirus," wrote Zhang, leader of the Shanghai team of experts in the clinical treatment of novel coronavirus pneumonia cases.
"China is currently accelerating building up scientific support, including reserves of effective vaccines and drugs as well as public health and medical resource that can support China's large-scale opening to the world and empower the country to deal with normalized pandemic fight in the next stage," he wrote.
With science and solidarity, the country will cope with the Omicron variant properly just as how it has done with Delta, said Zhang, who is also director of the infectious diseases department at Huashan Hospital Affiliated with Fudan University.
Zhang wrote that it will take the world around two weeks to see whether the new variant will pose threat to the vulnerable immunity of population that has taken shape in some societies initially.
He also explained why some countries, such as the United Kingdom and Israel, have tightened up pandemic prevention restrictions on inbound travelers.
"Over 80 percent of the citizens in those two countries have been fully vaccinated. If the new variant is able to break through the immune barriers there, the world may have to change its COVID-19 vaccination mechanism – adjusting it to something like the influenza vaccination, which requires researchers to device a new vaccine according to the virus' mutation each year," he wrote.
http://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/20211 ... 77f24.html
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Omicron variant: South Africa being 'punished' by international community, says Dirco
Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Naledi Pandor.
*The international community is "punishing" South Africa, Dirco has said.
*This comes amid a slew of travel restrictions following the identification of the Omicron variant.
*The WHO has urged countries to not impose travel restrictions in a knee-jerk reaction.
South Africa is being "punished" for identifying the new Omicron Covid-19 variant, the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (Dirco) has said in a statement.
The department said South Africa should be applauded for identifying the new variant, instead of being shut out by the international community.
Several countries and regions instituted travel restrictions and cancelled flights since the announcement of the new Omicron variant, including the UK, US and EU.
South African scientists announced the new variant on Thursday, after it was traced during genome sequencing.
"New variants have been detected in other countries. Each of those cases have had no recent links with southern Africa. It's worth noting that the reaction to those countries is starkly different to cases in southern Africa," said Dirco.
"This latest round of travel bans is akin to punishing South Africa for its advanced genomic sequencing and the ability to detect new variants quicker. Excellent science should be applauded and not punished."
According to the statement, the government was aligning itself with a call by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to international leaders, imploring them not to "engage in knee-jerk reactions" and impose travel restrictions.
WHO Head of Emergencies Michael Ryan stressed the importance of waiting for more data on the Omicron variant.
We've seen in the past, the minute there's any kind of mention of any kind of variation and everyone is closing borders and restricting travel. It's really important that we remain open, and stay focused," Ryan said.
Dirco said South Africa's capacity to test and its ramped-up vaccination programme, backed up by a world class scientific community, should give its global partners the comfort that the government was doing "as well as they are in managing the pandemic".
Dirco Minister Naledi Pandor, said: "Whilst we respect the right of all countries to take the necessary precautionary measures to protect their citizens, we need to remember that this pandemic requires collaboration and sharing of expertise. Our immediate concern is the damage that these restrictions are causing to families, the travel and tourism industries and business."
https://www.news24.com/news24/southafri ... o-20211127
"No good deed goes unpunished."
A man wearing a face mask walks past a bus in London, Britain, on Nov. 24, 2021. | Photo: Xinhua
Published 28 November 2021 (16 hours 22 minutes ago)
All variants of COVID-19, including the Delta variant that is currently dominant worldwide, can cause severe disease or death, in particular for the most vulnerable people, and thus prevention is always key.
It is not yet clear whether the Omicron COVID-19 variant is more transmissible, or causes more severe disease compared to other variants including Delta, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Sunday.
WHO said it's not yet clear whether Omicron is more easily spread from person to person compared to other variants, even though the number of people testing positive has risen in South Africa where this variant was involved.
It's also not yet clear whether Omicron causes more severe disease, but preliminary data suggests that there are increasing rates of hospitalization in South Africa, which however may be due to increasing overall numbers of people becoming infected.
WHO confirmed that there is currently no information to suggest that symptoms associated with Omicron are different from those from other variants, as understanding the level of severity of the Omicron variant will take days to several weeks.
All variants of COVID-19, including the Delta variant that is currently dominant worldwide, can cause severe disease or death, in particular for the most vulnerable people, and thus prevention is always key.
However, WHO said preliminary evidence suggests there may be an increased risk of reinfection with Omicron, but information is limited. More information on this will become available in the coming days and weeks.
It added that current PCR tests continue to detect Omicron, while further studies are still going on to understand how the Omicron variant will impact on available vaccines and treatments to COVID-19.
WHO classified on Friday the latest variant B.1.1.529 of SARS-CoV-2 virus, now with the name Omicron, as a "Variant of Concern" (VOC).
According to WHO's definition, a VOC, with a degree of global public health significance, demonstrates one or more of mutational changes, such as increase in transmissibility or detrimental change in COVID-19 epidemiology, increase in virulence or change in clinical disease presentation, and decrease in effectiveness of public health and social measures or available diagnostics, vaccines, therapeutics.
WHO has since called on countries to enhance surveillance and sequencing on circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants, submit complete genome sequences and metadata to a publicly available database, and report initial VOC cases or clusters to WHO.
It has also recommended field investigations and laboratory assessments to better understand potential impacts of the VOC on COVID-19 epidemiology, the effectiveness of public health and social measures and antibody neutralization.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/COV ... -0007.html
*****************************
US Scrambles To Take Actions Over Omicron's Chilling Effect
Tourist area in New York, U.S., Nov. 28, 2021. | Photo: Twitter/ @rupinder_hardy
Published 29 November 2021 (30 minutes ago)
President Biden announced his country will impose travel restrictions on eight African countries including South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi.
The newly-discovered Omicron variant of COVID-19 in South Africa has raised fears about the global trajectory of the pandemic, while some countries including the United States have raced to impose travel restrictions on southern African countries.
On Friday, U.S. President Joe Biden announced that his country will impose travel restrictions on eight African countries including South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi. Except for this "precautionary" measure, Biden again urged Americans and people around the world to get vaccinated against the virus.
Australia and Japan are also among the latest nations on Saturday to either halt flights to the region or announce mandatory quarantines and screenings. The World Health Organization (WHO) said there was preliminary evidence that the Omicron variant was more transmissible than the Delta one. Meanwhile, Belgium, Israel and Botswana also detected first cases of the new variant.
"Although scientists were still figuring out the exact effects of the variant's many mutations, its discovery highlights the continued threat posed by an evolving virus to the world's emergence from the pandemic," reported The Wall Street Journal on Friday.
U.S. officials have spoken with scientists and leaders in South Africa to learn more about Omicron. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that Omicron hadn't been identified in the United States.
The WHO labeled Omicron a "variant of concern," a designation given to variants like Delta that require close scrutiny from public health officials. Preliminary evidence suggested that Omicron may increase the risk of reinfection relative to other variants of concern. South African researchers identified the first Omicron case on Nov. 9, then reported the variant to the WHO on Wednesday. Scientists are hopeful that they spotted the variant early, since the majority of known cases are still concentrated in southern Africa.
"Scientists are still waiting on lab studies to determine how well coronavirus antibodies -- either from natural infection or vaccines -- hold up against Omicron. They're also watching carefully to see how quickly the variant spreads across the globe, particularly in countries with higher vaccination rates," reported Business Insider on Saturday.
Moderna, BioNTech-Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson all said that they're testing how well their vaccines protect against Omicron. Merck said in a final analysis of a clinical trial, its antiviral pill reduced the risk of hospitalization and death among high-risk COVID-19 patients by 30 percent, down from an earlier estimate of 50 percent.
"News of the Omicron variant, which has an unusually high number of mutations, will certainly throw a spanner in the works for the Biden administration as the president struggles with flagging approval ratings and a pessimistic view of the economy," reported CNN on Friday. "The administration will need to work quickly to get ahead of the new variant."
The pandemic is far from over, and after nearly two years and more than 775,000 deaths, many Americans are traumatized and on edge, said the television network, adding that with the variants stymying hopes of a full recovery, "it has become increasingly difficult to embrace any good news, as fear and uncertainty continue to dictate so much of our lives.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US- ... -0003.html
*********************************
Expert: China capable of dealing with new variant
By Zhou Wenting in Shanghai | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2021-11-28 16:40
A healthcare worker conducts a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) COVID-19 test on a traveler at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg on November 27, 2021, after several countries banned flights from South Africa following the discovery of a new COVID-19 variant Omicron. A flurry of countries around the world have banned ban flights from southern Africa following the discovery of the variant, including the United States, Canada, Australia,Thailand, Brazil and several European countries. [Photo/Agencies]
The new COVID-19 variant Omicron, which the World Health Organization has termed a "variant of concern" and is more transmissible than the dominant Delta strain, will not have a major influence on China at the current phase, Zhang Wenhong, a Shanghai doctor widely known for his pandemic fight, wrote on his Sina Weibo on Sunday.
"China's current strategies of rapid response and dynamically zeroing cases will be able to cope with various types of variants of the novel coronavirus," wrote Zhang, leader of the Shanghai team of experts in the clinical treatment of novel coronavirus pneumonia cases.
"China is currently accelerating building up scientific support, including reserves of effective vaccines and drugs as well as public health and medical resource that can support China's large-scale opening to the world and empower the country to deal with normalized pandemic fight in the next stage," he wrote.
With science and solidarity, the country will cope with the Omicron variant properly just as how it has done with Delta, said Zhang, who is also director of the infectious diseases department at Huashan Hospital Affiliated with Fudan University.
Zhang wrote that it will take the world around two weeks to see whether the new variant will pose threat to the vulnerable immunity of population that has taken shape in some societies initially.
He also explained why some countries, such as the United Kingdom and Israel, have tightened up pandemic prevention restrictions on inbound travelers.
"Over 80 percent of the citizens in those two countries have been fully vaccinated. If the new variant is able to break through the immune barriers there, the world may have to change its COVID-19 vaccination mechanism – adjusting it to something like the influenza vaccination, which requires researchers to device a new vaccine according to the virus' mutation each year," he wrote.
http://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/20211 ... 77f24.html
***************************************
Omicron variant: South Africa being 'punished' by international community, says Dirco
Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Naledi Pandor.
*The international community is "punishing" South Africa, Dirco has said.
*This comes amid a slew of travel restrictions following the identification of the Omicron variant.
*The WHO has urged countries to not impose travel restrictions in a knee-jerk reaction.
South Africa is being "punished" for identifying the new Omicron Covid-19 variant, the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (Dirco) has said in a statement.
The department said South Africa should be applauded for identifying the new variant, instead of being shut out by the international community.
Several countries and regions instituted travel restrictions and cancelled flights since the announcement of the new Omicron variant, including the UK, US and EU.
South African scientists announced the new variant on Thursday, after it was traced during genome sequencing.
"New variants have been detected in other countries. Each of those cases have had no recent links with southern Africa. It's worth noting that the reaction to those countries is starkly different to cases in southern Africa," said Dirco.
"This latest round of travel bans is akin to punishing South Africa for its advanced genomic sequencing and the ability to detect new variants quicker. Excellent science should be applauded and not punished."
According to the statement, the government was aligning itself with a call by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to international leaders, imploring them not to "engage in knee-jerk reactions" and impose travel restrictions.
WHO Head of Emergencies Michael Ryan stressed the importance of waiting for more data on the Omicron variant.
We've seen in the past, the minute there's any kind of mention of any kind of variation and everyone is closing borders and restricting travel. It's really important that we remain open, and stay focused," Ryan said.
Dirco said South Africa's capacity to test and its ramped-up vaccination programme, backed up by a world class scientific community, should give its global partners the comfort that the government was doing "as well as they are in managing the pandemic".
Dirco Minister Naledi Pandor, said: "Whilst we respect the right of all countries to take the necessary precautionary measures to protect their citizens, we need to remember that this pandemic requires collaboration and sharing of expertise. Our immediate concern is the damage that these restrictions are causing to families, the travel and tourism industries and business."
https://www.news24.com/news24/southafri ... o-20211127
"No good deed goes unpunished."