Coronavirus: Lifting restrictions 'right thing to do' says Eustice
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WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan warned that the world is not yet out of the woods when it comes to Covid.
She said that there will be more variants in the future as the virus “evolves, mutates”.
Ms Swaminatha added that “we are not at the end of the pandemic”.
This is a breaking story. More to follow.
She was speaking to reporters n South Africa, where she was visiting vaccine manufacturing facilities with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
It comes a day after John Nkengasong, Director of Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said the BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron is now the dominant variant in South Africa.
It has also been detected in at least six other African countries.
Mr Nkengasong said BA.2 had been identified in Mozambique, Senegal, Botswana, Mauritius, Kenya and Malawi.
He added that the sub-variant was likely to be present elsewhere but may not have been detected yet due to weaker surveillance systems.
Mr Nkengasongtold a media briefing: “We have data from South Africa that the BA.2 lineage has now become the predominant variant in South Africa.”
Also known as the “stealth” Omicron variant, BA.2 has already been identified in Denmark and the UK.
Data from the CDC updated Tuesday shows that BA.2 made up four percent of sequenced cases in the US during the week of February 5.
Epidemiologist Eric Feigi-Ding wrote on Twitter: “Sub-variant surging.
“The BA.2 sublineage of Omicron has tripled in one week (in the US), dislodging the old Omicron from total dominance
“BA.2 now at 3.6 percent and climbing fast. Expect to be dominant by March.”
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