Health Officials Monitoring 'Stealth Omicron' Variant

Stealth Omicron' Variant

The new subvariant is one of at least four omicron offshoots, and has quickly become the dominant version of the virus in Denmark.  

Health officials have been monitoring a new coronavirus subvariant that has been detected in at least 40 countries and is responsible for almost 100 cases in the U.S.

And although it is exhausting to even contemplate, a Yale researcher said it has already made its way to Connecticut.

The new flavor, BA.2, is one of at least four omicron offshoots, and has quickly become the dominant version of the virus in Denmark.  Nathan Grubaugh, an associate professor with the Yale School of Public Health, said that BA.2 is more transmissible than its parent, BA.a, moving up the charts quickly throughout Europe, and "likely will become the dominant SARS-CoV-2 in the US too."

At the moment, however, it's not even officially a new variant. Because it is more difficult to identify than the OG strain of omicron, researchers have christened it "stealth omicron."  Tom Peacock, a prominent British virologist at Imperial College London, said that BA.1 and BA.2 were alike where it counted: their vulnerability to the existing vaccines.

 

"There is likely to be minimal differences in vaccine effectiveness against BA.1 and BA.2," Peacock said on Twitter. "Personally, I'm not sure BA.2 is going to have a substantial impact on the current Omicron wave of the pandemic."

                                                                   CT COVID-19 Hospitalizations

Frequent and repetitive testing allows public health officials the data to follow infectiousness and transmissibility in a linear fashion. Generalized population sampling also allows early detection of mutant strains. It is well known that flu-like illnesses, SARS, and SARSCovid all follow these properties, and will continue to do so from season to season.  The more the virus multiplies, the more opportunity it has to mutate.  Preventive vaccination reduces the viral load, masking and distancing are two other methods of reducing viral mutations.

               

CT Health Officials Monitoring 'Stealth Omicron' Variant | New Canaan, CT Patch