As the holiday season approaches, many countries are still affected by a fifth epidemic wave caused by the Delta variant. The concern is always present, in particular ...

With Omicron, will Covid-19 become endemic?

With the Omicron variant, the Covid-19 pandemic could turn into an endemic.

Text by: Simon Rozé Follow

3 min

As the holiday season approaches, many countries are still affected by a fifth epidemic wave caused by the Delta variant.

The concern is still present, especially with the emergence of Omicron which is spreading more and more.

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This is a speech that we hear more and more in the scientific community: the Covid-19 pandemic will turn into an endemic. The disease will not go away and you will have to live with it, as is already the case with the flu and other illnesses. This phase change is to the credit of the Omicron variant.

"
It is the perfect endemic virus

said Christian Drosten, director of the institute of virology at the Charité hospital in Berlin.

"We are not yet ready to face it in our elderly countries, with imperfect population immunity,

" he said in

his podcast

He continues,

“
We cannot allow immunologically naive people to get infected.
It would kill too many people.
This is why we need to buy time to scale up the vaccination.
The priority is to vaccinate the unvaccinated.
The third dose does not come until after, it will not allow us to enter the endemic phase without breakage.
"

►Also read: South Africa: Omicron more contagious but a less serious form of Covid-19 according to the Netcare hospital group

However, according to the first data, it appears that the Covid-19 induced by Omicron are less serious than those of the other variants.

This is particularly evident in South Africa, where the largest amount of data is available.

The explosion in the number of cases does not translate into hospitalizations or deaths of the same order.

However, it cannot yet be concluded that this variant is less virulent than the previous ones.

The South African population is young, and has largely been immunized by vaccination or previous infection with Beta or Delta variants.

Western countries are not in this situation.

First laboratory information

However, certain elements are starting to dispel the fog a bit.

In addition to epidemiological field data, the laboratories give their first results.

Researchers from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Hong Kong have thus carried out

a work

that has been widely commented on in the scientific community.

Still being proofread before publication, this study shows that Omicron multiplies much better in the bronchi than the previous variants and less well in lung tissue.

This corresponds to the two observations mentioned: increased contagiousness and attenuated virulence.

Indeed, a virus present in large numbers in the bronchi is more easily excreted and therefore spreads more.

Its virulence would be less, because the lungs would then be less affected by the infection.

Even if they are in line with the findings on the ground, these results still need to be put into perspective.

This is just laboratory work.

In real life, a virus that replicates hugely can

have dire consequences on the immune system response

and this could not be looked at in this work.

We will therefore have to wait to see if this is confirmed, and whether or not it is good news.

This is all the more the case because even if it is less virulent, Omicron will strike many more people.

Mechanically, it will do more damage than the previous variants.

Faced with it, while some believe its inexorable progress, only meager means of individual protection remain.

Vaccination first.

While waiting for the vaccine update to specifically tackle Omicron, the first data show an effectiveness of three doses to prevent severe forms.

Infections will still be possible, but their severity will be reduced, as will transmission to some extent.

Finally, the habits adopted for almost two years should be kept: wearing a mask, barrier gestures and above all frequent ventilation of enclosed places.

With Omicron, will Covid-19 become endemic?

With Omicron, will Covid-19 become endemic?

First laboratory information

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