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Reopened vaccination center in Zorbau, Saxony-Anhalt
Photo: Jan Woitas / picture alliance / dpa / dpa-Zentralbild
More than 30 mutations in the spike protein, some of them in areas that could increase the transferability of the coronavirus or weaken immune protection against it - the findings about the new omicron variant do not bode well.
While there are still many uncertainties, professionals are concerned.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has classified Omikron as "worrying," and vaccine manufacturers analyze the genetics of the mutant to find out how well it escapes antibodies.
Results will only be available in a few days and weeks.
Questions about the severity of the diseases that the variant triggers and about transferability can only be answered in the future.
All of this creates uncertainty.
There is now increasing discussion of whether vaccination or boosting is still worthwhile if the next variant could soon be circulating that reduces protection.
The appearance of Omikron does not change anything in the current situation in Germany.
What needs to be done remains clear.
The seven-day incidence nationwide is 452, in one district it has exceeded the two thousand mark.
In the hospitals it is getting more and more crowded, in some intensive care units there is no longer enough space to provide the best possible care for all patients.
Almost 400 people die from and with Covid-19 every day.
The situation is dramatic and the reason for this is not Omikron, but Delta.
99.9 percent of the cases are due to Delta
"In Germany, as in other European countries, practically all infections are caused by the Delta variant (B.1.617.2)," said the weekly report from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) on Thursday.
99.9 percent of infections in this country can be traced back to this mutant.
Alpha, beta, gamma and other variants basically do not appear (any longer).
It is correct: Omikron could change that.
Waiting before vaccinating would be exactly the wrong reaction.
As soon as Delta appeared, the understandable reflex arose to wait and see.
Indeed, the vaccine was less protective against the variant than against previous, less contagious virus lines.
The bottom line was that the vaccination still worked.
It is impossible to imagine the situation in which Germany would find itself if an even larger part of the population were exposed to the virus without protection.
Relaxation of public life, to the extent that it was possible over many months, would have been inconceivable, but the burden on the health system was immense.
And vaccination also pays off in the current situation: The fact that 70 percent of the population has already received at least two doses enables quick third-party vaccinations, which then increase the protection against infection against Delta.
This saves time and time is known to be a decisive factor in the pandemic.
"If we were able to boost 30 percent of the population within 30 days, that is about one percent every day, there would already be a significant decrease in infection activity after this period," said modeler Kai Nagel in an interview with SPIEGEL.
Modeler Viola Priesemann comes to a similar conclusion.
Experts also agree that an overall higher vaccination rate would significantly ease the situation.
A vaccination makes sense in any case
If everything goes well, the plan will work in the long term.
Omikron may not even prevail against Delta, it may even lead to weaker progress, or it may hardly be able to bypass the immune protection after the vaccination.
Who knows?
If things go bad, Omikron will make the way out of the pandemic more difficult.
It may be that the variant significantly reduces the effectiveness of the vaccination.
That people who have been vaccinated are more easily infected with Omikron than with Delta.
That they too get seriously ill more often.
Nobody knows either.
But there is one thing that nobody can take away from the vaccinated: In addition to specific antibodies against a variant, their body also has more unspecific defense forces ready, which then fight viruses that differ slightly from the original variant.
As a reminder, Delta is also not the version of the pathogen that the vaccines were originally designed against.
In all likelihood, even in the worst case scenario, vaccinated people will be better protected from Covid-19 than unvaccinated people.
So it stays that way: every dose counts.
