This is the advance of omicron, the guest you do not want this Christmas

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Ómicron

, the latest and worrying variant of SARS-CoV-2, has already been detected in

and continues to spread exponentially, "doubling its cases in the communities where it is transmitted

." This was highlighted yesterday by the World Health Organization, which also reported that, in South Africa, the country that sounded the alarm about omicron, the rates of contagion of this variant are already falling.

The appearance of a variant of the coronavirus that leads us to an apocalyptic scenario is a fear that resurfaces periodically, as we are exhausting the Greek alphabet.

It is not yet clear what the

, although preliminary data show that it has a high transmission and reinfection capacity and perhaps greater mildness than its predecessors.

The latest analysis by the British Health Agency indicates that patients with omicron have a

probability

compared to other versions of the coronavirus, such as delta.

The problem, they emphasize, is that its great ability to spread can compromise that apparent less aggressiveness.

In addition, to date, omicron has mainly affected young people, under 40 years of age, so there is no certainty as to what will happen in older age groups.

This analysis is in line with other work published this week by researchers from

, which suggests that people infected with omicron are 40% less likely to be hospitalized for one night or more, compared to those who they become infected by the delta variant.

This multicenter study was carried out between December 1 and 14 on

Along this optimistic path, another work carried out by researchers from the University of Hong Kong pointed out that replication in human lung tissue was less efficient, about 10 times less than previous variants, but not the one that occurs in the bronchi (it multiplies 70 times faster than the delta variant and the Wuhan variant), which would point to milder symptoms but greater transmissibility.

Although it is natural to want to believe that the new variant is milder than the previous ones, in particular than the current dominant one, experts warn that these studies are still preliminary, and also that there are studies that would indicate a severity similar to that of delta.

Roger Paredes, head of the Department of Infectious Diseases and of the IrsiCaixa Institute for AIDS Research IrsiCaixa Hospital Universitari Germans Trias I Pujol de Badalona, ​​comments “that the data are initial and there may be biases, because now omicron is circulating especially in the young population, among 20 and 30, which has a

.

In past waves we have already seen that problems come when older people start to get infected.

Still no certainties.

In addition, the severity of the variant may be attenuated by vaccination and previous infections ”.

At the moment, “

.

In any case, the level of hospital saturation is guaranteed, if adequate measures are not taken, "says Paredes.

Because if something is evident, it is the accelerated growth of omicron throughout the world.

In Spain, the latest report from the Ministry indicates an almost 14-fold increase in omicron cases.

We have gone from 3.4% positive for the new variant among the samples sequenced from November 29 to December 5, to 47.2% in the week of December 6 to 12.

Paredes warns: "Even if the omicron variant was half as severe as delta, we would have many hospitalizations."

The omicron variant has found a way to break the barrier raised by covid vaccines (none of the available ones are sterilizing) or with previous natural infection by variant. This was highlighted by

, director general of the WHO, this week when noting that with omicron it is "more likely that people who have been vaccinated or have recovered from covid-19 can become infected or reinfected."

In a

study

(obviously the most abundant thing about omicron) researchers from the United Kingdom show that the efficacy of the two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine drops to 40% at four months and is practically

at 15 weeks from full AstraZeneca vaccine regimen. However, with the

the mRNA vaccine,

associated with the new variant

was achieved

of

in those who initially received AstraZeneca (heterologous vaccination) and

, in those vaccinated with Pfizer.

Moderna 's

also showed an increase in antibody titers, decreased between 41 and 84 times in the face of the new variant.

The company recently reported that the extra 50 g dose of its vaccine increases the levels of neutralizing antibodies against omicron by about 37 times, while a 100 g booster dose of mRNA-1273 increases it by 83 times.

There is no firm data yet on the extent to which the booster doses will have on omicron.

A small published study has reported the case of seven people who became infected with the new variant after receiving the third dose of an mRNA vaccine.

None had had a previous SARS-CoV-2 infection.

In Israel, where there has been a clear reduction in mortality from covid-19 -before the omicron irruption- thanks to the third injections, the administration of a

in people over 60 years old and in health professionals

has just been announced

.

Meanwhile, pharmaceutical companies are working on

their

- both mRNA and adenoviral

- to the new variant, although the

. "Let me emphasize that there is

still no answer to the question of whether we

need a vaccine to measure, with a different composition, to combat this or any other variant ,

" the executive director of the EMA, said at a

news conference this week

, and added that receiving a booster is "the best protection at this time."

The EMA may be confident in the arrival of

that are capable of inducing sterilizing immunity against any variant of the virus, such as the one being developed by the team led by Luis Enjuanes and Isabel Sola, at the Centro's Coronavirus Laboratory National of Biotechnology (CNB-CSIC).

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