Omicron enters more US states as threat assessed

NEW YORK－The Omicron variant of COVID-19 had been identified in more than a dozen people in at least 10 US states by Saturday as the federal government continued to fight the pandemic with vaccinations.

Some of those in the US who have contracted the new variant had recently traveled to southern Africa, where it was first identified, while at least two states reported community spread of the new variant. States to report Omicron cases span the country from Hawaii to California and New York.

"It's certainly spreading in the US," said Samuel Scarpino, managing director of pathogen surveillance at the Rockefeller Foundation, according to reports by The Wall Street Journal, which also said that US officials expect vaccines to provide at least some level of protection against severe disease from Omicron.

The Washington Post said on Saturday that though about 1 in 420 people in the US have died of COVID-19 and the country is still averaging more than 1,000 deaths a day, death rates are far below the national average in the most-vaccinated, often-urban areas.

Researchers worldwide are still piecing together data, early anecdotal evidence and existing COVID-19 knowledge to better understand the new, mutated Omicron variant of the coronavirus. "Less than two weeks into the global effort, those clues are giving experts a glimpse of the variant's threat," USA Today reported on Saturday.

The consensus has been that vaccines are likely to continue to protect against severe disease, but the variant may prove highly infectious, even among those fully vaccinated or who have previously been infected. The variant is driving a sharp rise in cases in South Africa, and the spread to dozens of countries, the report said.

Spreading fast

On Saturday Chile reported its first case of the Omicron variant. A foreign national residing in Chile returned from Ghana on Nov 25 and tested positive in a test at Santiago airport, authorities said.

Romania's health ministry said on Saturday that it had detected the first two cases of the Omicron variant in two Romanians who returned from South Africa on Nov 30.

Tens of thousands of protesters marched in several cities in northwestern Europe on Saturday to demonstrate against coronavirus restrictions imposed amid a surge in infections.

More than 40,000 people marched through Vienna to protest against a lockdown and plans to make vaccinations compulsory to curb the spread of the virus.

Several thousand people gathered in the central Dutch town of Utrecht on Saturday to protest against new coronavirus restrictions that came into force the previous weekend.

Princess Beatrix of the Netherlands has tested positive for COVID-19, the Dutch government said on Saturday.

Xinhua - Agencies