Omicron’s new variant BA. 2 spreads around the world: What you need to know

A new sub-variant of the Omicron coronavirus may spread faster, and be deadlier, causing more severe infectious disease.

A new sub-variant of the Omicron coronavirus may spread faster, and be deadlier, causing more severe infectious disease, researchers warn.

Eric Feigl-Ding, a Harvard-trained epidemiologist wrote that the subvariant — BA. 2 — is “seriously bad news”.

“Even the World Health Organisation is getting very concerned about BA. 2 variant outcompeting and displacing old Omicron,” he wrote on Twitter.

Based on the rising cases from Denmark, where the sub-variant represents 90 per cent of all new cases, he said it is leading to more spikes in cases.

“Here is what is happening in the country with the most BA. 2 variant so far. (Denmark) has been BA. 2 dominant for weeks and have now almost no mitigations either … now their excess deaths are spiking again,” he said.

Researchers have been bracing for the same thing to happen in America.

“A lot of us were assuming that it was going to quickly take off in the United States just like it was doing in Europe and become the new dominant variant,” Nathan Grubaugh, an associate professor of epidemiology at the Yale School of Public Health said.

BA.2 has accounts for an estimated 3.9 per cent all new infections in the US, according to the US Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and appears to be doubling fast.

Their comments come after the World Health Organisation’s Technical Lead on Covid-19 Maria Van Kerkhove said it just shows how Covid-19 continues to be “dangerous”.

7) Let’s look at it this way—BA2 is much more aggressive than anything —both pink and green below are BA2 — but the green H78Y subtype of BA2 extra aggressive it seems. Meanwhile BA1 old Omicron near extinct in 🇩🇰! That doesn’t happen by chance. We need to raise BA2 as VOC asap! pic.twitter.com/veJRPOOwEa

— Eric Feigl-Ding (@DrEricDing) February 18, 2022

⚠️DEATHS INCREASING—new data shows both Danish🇩🇰 excess deaths & deaths “due to (caused by) COVID” increasing—surging by ⬆️34% for total COVID deaths, & ⬆️26.6% for deaths “caused by COVID” in one week. 📍Most COVID+ deaths due to COVID. (This is 🇩🇰CDC own table) #CovidIsNotOverpic.twitter.com/HksxTlL75A

— Eric Feigl-Ding (@DrEricDing) February 18, 2022

“We already know that Omicron has a growth advantage … compared to other variants of concern. But we know that BA. 2 has a growth advantage even over BA. 1,” she said,

“This virus continues to be dangerous. This virus transmits very efficiently between people but there’s a lot that you can do.

“We need to drive transmission down. Because if we don’t, we will not only see more cases, more hospitalisations, more deaths, but we will see more people suffering from Long Covid and we will see more opportunities for new variants to emerge. “So it’s a very dangerous situation that we’re in, three years in.”

Their observations come after lab research from Japan on Sunday on the prepublication bioRxiv open server, showed BA. 2 may have features that make it as capable of causing serious illness as the Delta variant.

BA. 2 is also resistant to some treatments, including sotrovimab, the monoclonal antibody that’s now being used against Omicron.

The findings, which have not been peer reviewed yet, also state: “It might be, from a human’s perspective, a worse virus than BA. 1 and might be able to transmit better and cause worse disease,” according to Dr Daniel Rhoads, section head of microbiology at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.

Dr Rhoads reviewed the study but was not part of the initial data collection and study.

But the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention’s director Dr Rochelle Walensky said: “There is no evidence that the BA. 2 lineage is more severe than the BA. 1 lineage. CDC continues to monitor variants that are circulating both domestically and internationally.

“We will continue to monitor emerging data on disease severity in humans and findings from papers like this conducted in laboratory settings.”