Omicron sub-variant spreading through UK is ‘worst yet’, expert warns

THE Omicron sub-variant spreading through the UK is the “worst variant yet” an expert has warned.

BA.5 is driving the summer wave of Covid, with cases estimated to be the highest they have ever been during the pandemic.

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American physician Dr Eric Topol raised concerns over the variant’s extreme ‘immune evasion and transmissibility’ following research. 

He said BA.5 ‘has far better ability to get into cells, which may help explain why this version of the virus has caused a lot of trouble’.

Not only is it in the Omicron family, but it has similarities to the infectious Delta strain – which produced severe symptoms and higher rates of hospitalisation.

Omicron has been shown in studies to cause more mild disease, however. 

Therefore, it is too early to say whether the BA.5 variant produces a more severe illness, Dr Topol said, but ‘possible given its Delta-like cell infectivity feature’.

Dr Topol suggested it was difficult to decipher quite how dangerous BA.5 is compared with previous strains when there is an ‘immunity wall’.

But he did say hospitalisations and deaths still appear to be uncoupled with infections – which suggests vaccines are still protecting against the worst of Covid.

He wrote in his newsletter Ground Truths: “The ability to infect cells for BA.5 is more akin to Delta than the previous Omicron family of variants.

“We are watching its accelerated evolution akin to the behaviour of a Formula One race car lapping around the track with humans in the stands.

“Our best protection from BA.5 infections and reinfections now consists of high-quality, well-fitted masks, physical distancing, air filtration, ventilation and vaccination + boosters,” Dr Topol warned. 

It comes as a leading Covid tracking study estimated the UK is experiencing record high levels of cases – 350,000 per day.

The ZOE Covid app reports one in 15 people in the UK currently have the bug.

It’s higher than that seen in the Omicron waves in the winter of 2021 (BA.1) and spring (BA.2).

It’s not only the UK experiencing a Covid resurgence – cases have been rising sharply since the end of May around most of Europe, Asia and the US.

The number of Covid cases has jumped by 30 per cent in the past two weeks, the World Health Organization said Tuesday, driven by sub-variants of the Omicron strain.

WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “Sub-variants of Omicron, like BA.4 and BA.5, continue to drive waves of cases, hospitalisation and death around the world.

“Surveillance has reduced significantly – including testing and sequencing – making it increasingly difficult to assess the impact of variants…”

Meanwhile, there are concerns for a new variant in India, BA.2.75, which ‘might be important, but it’s too early to know’, Dr Topol said.

Dubbed ‘Centaurus’, it’s also been seen in a handful of US infections.

Matthew Binnicker, director of clinical virology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota said it’s too early to draw too many conclusions.

“But it does look like, especially in India, the rates of transmission are showing kind of that exponential increase,” he told Medical Express.

Australia’s Health Minister Mark Butler warned vaccinated people were ‘still susceptible’ to the more aggressive variants of the illness.

“They’re even more infectious than the earlier sub-variants that drove the summer wave, the BA.1 wave in January and the BA.2 wave in April and May,”’ he said to news.com.au.

“What is particularly unique and different around BA.4 and BA.5, they’re very good at evading people’s immunity.”

He had previously warned there were signs someone could be re-infected with Omicron BA.4 or BA.5 just four weeks after initial BA.1 or BA.2.