‘Worse than previous Omicron’: New Covid warning on BA.2 virus

A sub-variant of the Omicron coronavirus may spread faster and may cause more severe disease, early research indicates.

A sub-variant of the Omicron coronavirus dubbed the BA.2 virus may spread faster, and may cause more severe disease, researchers warn.

New lab research from Japan on the pre-publication bioRxiv open server, shows BA.2 may have features that make it as capable of causing serious illness like the Delta variant.

BA.2 is also resistant to some treatments including sotrovimab, the monoclonal antibody that’s currently 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The findings, which have not been peer reviewed yet, also state: “It might be, from a human’s perspective, a worse virus than BA.1 and might be able to transmit better and cause worse disease,” according to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.”

COVID JAB IN PREGNANT MUMS ‘PROTECTS BABIES’

Babies born to mums who were vaccinated against Covid during pregnancy are less likely to be admitted to hospital with the disease in their first six months, according to a study.

The US research found that pregnant women not only protect themselves by getting vaccinated but also protect their newborns.

The results were based on mums who had two doses of the mRNA vaccines – Moderna or Pfizer.

The researchers looked at children under six months old between July 2021 and January 2022.

Pregnant woman with hands on stomach talking to obstetrician Picture: iStock

US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention’s Dr Dana Meaney-Delman said the data

“provides real-world evidence that getting a Covid-19 vaccine during pregnancy might help protect infants less than six months of age from hospitalisation due to Covid-19”.

“This is likely because they are born carrying their mother’s antibodies.

“When people receive an mRNA Covid-19 vaccine during pregnancy, their bodies build antibodies to protect against Covid-19 and these antibodies have been found in umbilical cord blood, indicating that the antibodies have transferred from the pregnant person to the developing infant. And while we know that these antibodies cross the placenta, until this study, we have not yet had data to demonstrate whether these antibodies might provide protection for the baby against Covid-19.”

Nurse checking weight of pregnant woman in hospital room.

The study found that Covid-19 vaccines were 61 per cent effective overall at preventing hospitalisations in children whose mothers were vaccinated during pregnancy.

It rose to 80 per cent when the mothers were vaccinated after 21 weeks to 14 days before delivery.

However, for those who were vaccinated early on in the pregnancy, protection for the babies fell to 32 per cent.

Dr Meaney-Delman said that among babies with Covid who were admitted to the ICU, the sickest babies, 88 per cent were born to mothers who were not vaccinated before or during pregnancy.

“And the one baby who died in the study was born to a mother who was not vaccinated,” she said.

“The bottom line is that maternal vaccination is a really important way to help protect these young infants.”

Originally published as ‘Worse than previous Omicron’: New Covid warning on BA.2 virus