Omikron "kills people": WHO chief sounds the alarm

Created: 01/07/2022, 11:43 AM

From: Lukas Rogalla

The Omikron variant is spreading quickly in Germany.

The WHO chief warns against relativizing the danger.

+++ 11.30 a.m.:

The WHO has renewed the warning against the Omikron variant.

The corona mutation was anything but "mild", it said in a statement.

"Just like previous variants, people have to be hospitalized for Omicron, and it kills people," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director of the World Health Organization.

Even if the Omikron variant usually leads to less severe disease courses from Covid-19 than the previously prevalent Delta variant, the variant should therefore not be classified as "mild".

An illustration of the Sars-CoV-2 coronavirus.

© AFP

You are currently experiencing a "tidal wave" of new corona infections from the Omikron variant, according to the WHO chief.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned that the mutation is “huge” and “fast” and leads to overloading of health systems worldwide.

Omikron: The proportion of the Corona variant is increasing rapidly

First report from Friday, January 7th, 2022, 9 a.m .:

Berlin - The Robert Koch Institute has new figures and data on the coronavirus.

Accordingly, the Corona variant * Omikron is spreading further in Germany - as expected by experts at breakneck speed.

In addition, the RKI has news regarding the effectiveness of the booster vaccination.

To this end, the institute in Berlin has evaluated numbers on hospital admissions.

Corona: Booster vaccination significantly increases protection in the elderly

Older people who have been vaccinated with full basic protection, i.e. usually two corona vaccinations, have on average a significantly higher risk of hospitalization than people with additional booster vaccinations.

This is shown by the latest data from the RKI.

The hospitalization incidence, which reflects the number of hospital admissions per week and 100,000 inhabitants, was 1.3 for boosted persons aged 60 and over in calendar week 51 (until December 26th).

The omicron variant of the coronavirus is spreading in Germany.

(Symbol photo) © Sebastian Gollnow / dpa

For senior citizens with full basic protection, the value was three times as high.

By far the greatest risk of having to go to hospital for Covid-19, however, had unvaccinated people with an incidence of 29.1.

Late registrations are expected for calendar week 51.

Omicron: Vaccinated people without a booster are less protected

There are signs that the protection against illness in people with full basic protection in particular decreases over time, as the RKI wrote in its weekly report on January 6, 2022.

However, this group is still very well protected from hospitalization or even a fatal outcome.

In addition, the RKI writes: "With regard to protection against hospitalization, the booster vaccination can show an increase in effectiveness in people aged 60 and over."

According to the RKI, it is not yet possible to reliably assess how well a booster vaccination protects against the highly contagious Omikron variant.

According to studies, vaccinated people without a booster are less protected from Omikron.

However, the RKI emphasizes: "There are indications that, according to the current state of knowledge, vaccination protection against serious illness is significantly less impaired than protection against infection / transmission."

The Corona variant Omikron was first discovered in November in South Africa.

It is significantly more contagious than the delta variant, which is currently dominating in Germany.

Experts assume that Omikron leads to milder courses as a result of an infection *.

Infected people therefore have to go to a clinic less often.

Omicron: Corona variant displaces Delta

The RKI has now announced that Omikron's share of the infection rate in Germany is increasing rapidly.

In calendar week 52 (until January 2nd, 2022), according to reporting data from the federal states, 44.3 percent of the corona evidence examined for variants was due to Omikron.

In the previous week, the RKI had given this value as 15.8 percent.

When counting, both evidence by genetic analysis (whole genome sequencing) and suspected cases based on so-called variant-specific PCR tests are taken into account.

The RKI's Corona weekly report says: "Current events in Germany are increasingly being determined by the worrying Omikron variant." The proportion of the delta variant, which until a few weeks ago had almost exclusively dominated infection, is steadily decreasing.

Corona: RKI continues to warn of the Omikron variant

The so-called random sample data are more meaningful, but less up-to-date than the reporting data.

Only complete genome sequences from randomly selected samples are included here.

According to the RKI, the Omikron share in calendar week 51 (until December 26th) was 20 percent compared to 9 percent in the previous week.

The Omikron variant can lead to "a sudden increase in the number of infections and rapid overloading of the health system and possibly other areas of care," warns the RKI.

The institute assesses the risk from Covid-19 in Germany as "very high".

On Friday (January 7th, 2022) the federal and state governments will discuss new measures at a corona summit to curb the spread of the Omikron variant.

(lrg / dpa) *