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 | | Daily reported coronavirus cases in the United States, seven-day average.The New York Times |
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Omicron was already in Europe |
Officials around the world have raced to ban flights from southern Africa, in an attempt to halt the spread of the Omicron variant, which was first reported in Botswana. |
That's at least a week before the W.H.O. labeled Omicron a "variant of concern," and before the arrival in Amsterdam of two flights from South Africa that carried passengers infected with the variant. |
The announcement from the Netherlands highlights just how little we know about the variant. Scientists still cannot say with certainty where or when the variant originated. We also still don't know how contagious it is, or whether it can evade vaccines. |
 | | The New York Times |
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Dutch officials said the two samples were taken at public testing sites on Nov. 19 and Nov. 23, and health authorities have started to conduct contact tracing in those areas. |
Across Europe, more than 44 cases of the new variant have been confirmed in 11 countries, according to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control. |
Andrea Ammon, the agency's director, said that all of the confirmed cases in Europe have exhibited mild symptoms or none at all, and that authorities were analyzing six further "probable" cases. She said they were also testing how the variant behaved in vaccinated people, and that more information was expected in a "couple of weeks." |
In the Netherlands, officials tightened restrictions on Sunday on businesses, including bars, restaurants and theaters, in response to a wave that began before Omicron was identified. Yesterday Dutch health officials reported more than 22,000 new cases, one of the country's highest daily totals since the pandemic began. |
The Dutch announcement on Omicron came after a chaotic scene in Amsterdam, where 600 passengers aboard two flights from South Africa were stranded on Friday. |
"They went around the world, who knows where," said Fabrizio Pregliasco, a prominent Italian virologist at the University of Milan. He said that all the passengers should have been forced to quarantine or isolate and monitored closely for seven to 10 days, especially because they could have caught the virus on the flight and tested negative as it incubated. |
"If this variant is very contagious, this flight is an explosive bomb," Pregliasco said. |
The flights, like the cruise ships of the early pandemic, have prompted fears of superspreader events and pose the question: Have the last 20 months taught us nothing about containment? |
While the world is focused on the new variant, there have been a couple of important developments in treatment. |
The drug, known as molnupiravir, has been shown to modestly reduce the risk of hospitalization and death, predominantly from the Delta, Mu and Gamma variants. |
It could be authorized in the U.S. within days, as the agency typically follows the panel's recommendation. In the coming weeks, the F.D.A. may also greenlight a similar pill from Pfizer that appears to be significantly more effective than Merck's. |
The pills will be especially important if Omicron causes a surge in infections because the treatments don't target the spike protein, where the variant has more than 30 mutations. |
Instead, the pills weaken two proteins involved in the virus's replication machinery. Omicron carries one mutation in each of these proteins, but neither looks as if it would stop the pills from doing their jobs. |
It's an indication that the company's popular and widely beneficial monoclonal antibody drugs may need to be updated in case the new variant spreads aggressively. |
Regeneron said it had already been testing future antibody drug candidates, and that preliminary analyses indicated that some of those "may have the potential to retain activity against the Omicron variant." More data is expected in the coming month. |
Consumers shopping on Amazon, for example, are often led to vendors selling KN95 masks, a Chinese-made mask that is often marketed as an N95 equivalent despite the lack of testing by U.S. regulators to confirm virus-filtering claims. |
In fact, KN95 masks offered on Amazon and through other retailers are being sold without authorization from the F.D.A. for their use in health care settings. |
These masks include those from brands like Boncare, which is produced by a company that has repeatedly failed federal testing standards, and ChiSip, an Amazon top seller whose manufacturer, Chengde Technology, was cited by the C.D.C. for falsely claiming approval by federal regulators. |
All but a handful of the 50 best-selling KN95 masks on Amazon are plagued by similar problems, according to a recent analysis. |
Experts say the flood of fake and poorly made masks are a threat to public health because they give people a false sense of security, increasing the likelihood that someone might be exposed to the virus while attending class, a music concert or when traveling by plane. |
Just as many of us were becoming comfortable with hosting family get-togethers, returning to work or rejoining the gym, a new variant of the coronavirus is creating fresh uncertainty. |
Not knowing what's in store with Omicron can take us back to other turbulent times during the pandemic, when confusion was a regular part of life. |
As we enter this next phase of unpredictability, we'd like to know: How are you feeling, and what are you doing about it? We may use your response in an upcoming newsletter. If you'd like to participate, fill out this form here. |
What else we're following |
In the early days of the pandemic I couldn't find toilet paper in any of my usual stores. My sister-in-law had bought some vodka when she'd visited the previous year and we still had most of it left. I went on our neighborhood email loop and offered vodka for toilet paper. No one wanted the vodka, but four different neighbors stopped by to drop off toilet paper for us. More than a year later, toilet paper is no problem. And we still have the vodka. We love our neighborhood! — Betty Lehrman, Framingham, Mass. |
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