WHO busy with risk assessment of new Omicron subvariant

The World Health Organization says it’s currently conducting an ongoing risk assessment of the new omicron subvariant XBB.1.5.

Medical scientists say this subvariant is one of more than 500 that the WHO is tracking worldwide. WHO technical lead on covid-19, Dr Maria van Kerk-Hove, says the global health body’s technical advisory group met last week to discuss this subvariant.

” Based on its characteristics it is part of Omicron it is an incredibly transmissible variant like all of them it does have a growth advantage compared to (can’t hear) of Omicron but the data that we have to assess that XBB.1.5 is currently very limited”, she said.

Van Kerk-Hove says most of the current information available on this subvariant is from the United States.

” We do know from the available data that it does have a growth advantage, it does have similar properties of (can’t hear) like XVB, we don’t yet have data on severity and that is under assessment in the United States but also elsewhere”, she added.

-EWN

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