The EG.5 coronavirus strain that is circulating in China and the United States was labeled a “variant of interest” by the World Health Organization on Wednesday, although it did not seem to represent a greater danger to public health than previous variations.
The fast-spreading version, which accounts for an estimated more than 17% of infections in the US, has been linked to an increase in the virus not just in that nation but also in China, South Korea, Japan, and Canada, among other nations.
In a risk assessment, the WHO said that the data “taken together does not suggest that EG.5 has additional public health risks relative to the other currently circulating Omicron descendent lineages.”
It went on to say that the danger presented by EG.5 required a more thorough analysis.
Since the virus’s emergence, COVID-19 has caused the deaths of more than 6.9 million individuals worldwide and more than 768 million confirmed cases. In March 2020, the WHO labeled the outbreak a pandemic, and COVID-19’s worldwide emergency designation was lifted in May of this year.
The WHO’s technical head on COVID-19, Maria Van Kerkhove, said that while EG.5 was more transmissible than other Omicron variants, it was not more severe.
In comparison to other sublineages of Omicron that have been in circulation since late 2021, “we don’t detect a change in severity of EG.5”, she added.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general, lamented the fact that several nations failed to provide WHO with COVID-19 data.
Only 11% of hospital and ICU admissions linked to the virus, according to him.
In response, WHO released a series of COVID standing guidelines in which it asked nations to continue providing vaccine and reporting COVID data, especially death and morbidity data.
According to Van Kerkhove, attempts to combat the virus are being hampered by the lack of data from several nations.
She said that “about a year ago, we were in a much better position to either act or be more agile.” “And now the time it takes for us to accomplish it is becoming longer. And this is something we are becoming worse at.”
