BY JOHN HOUANIHAU
The New variant in transmission and the cause of the second wave of covid-19 infection in the country has been identified as BA.2 omicron variant.
Minister of Health Hon Culwick Togamana said its first resurgent was noted in Honiara on the 13th of April 2022.
In his covid-19 update address on 30th April 2022 he said that following a number of swabs conducted, 40 samples were collected and sent to Australia for genome sequencing.
“Samples sent between April 6 and April 19 and from 37 samples that we have results, 4 were delta, 33 which is about 90%, were omicron variant BA.2.
“Officially the genome sequencing has detected omicron variant specifically its BA.2 sub-variant as the new variant in our country and has been the cause for the second wave of covid-19 infection,’’ said Minister Togamana.
He said the World Health Organisation (WHO) rapidly classified the omicron as a variant of concern due to a large number of mutations it contains.
He adds that Omicron can still cause severe illness and even death, especially in people who are at risk of severe outcomes such as the elderly and those with severe underline health conditions.
“Omicron like the other variants continue to go under mutation or change and there are now two main sub-variants BA.1 and BA.2,’’ said the minister.
He said that many more people have been hospitalized than at any other time in the pandemic not because omicron is very severe but because it can cause so many infections over a period of time
He said there is evidence that the omicron BA2 variant was in circulation on April 6 and is now the primary driver of the resurgent covid19 cases in Honiara.
He said the BA.2 sub-variant is more dominant in Australia, the USA, and New Zealand.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the Omicron created record-setting spikes of cases for two reasons:
“First, it was more transmissible than earlier variants, and it could evade some of the protection from vaccines and previous infections and recently BA.2 has spread even faster than BA.1.
The WHO found that BA.2’s rapid growth is linked to its unique mutations. BA.2 has eight mutations not found in BA.1.
Their findings showed that in countries like the United States that have come through major spikes of BA.1 infections, the immunity that has built up may shield them from a major BA.2 spike.
The WHO reports that vaccines continued to protect people against severe diseases, especially those who received a booster.
They stated that throughout the Omicron surge, vaccines remained highly effective against hospitalizations.
The BA.2 according to WHO was nicknamed the “stealth variant” early in the Omicron wave, when scientists had a difficult time tracking it in positive P.C.R. tests.
The WHO stressed that Scientists believed that at the time, most infections were either caused by BA.1 or Delta.
“The P.C.R. tests use three genes to detect the coronavirus, and one of BA.1’s mutations caused it to come up negative for one of those genes.
“That difference offered an easy way to track the variants: Delta would test positive for all three genes, whereas BA.1 would test positive for only two.
“But BA.2 lacked the mutation that caused BA.1 to come up negative for one gene meaning that when looking at P.C.R. test results, BA.2 was indistinguishable from Delta — hence the “stealth variant” nickname.
Scientists first discovered the Omicron variant in November, and it quickly became clear that the viral lineage already existed as three genetically distinct varieties. Each branch of Omicron had its own set of unique mutations.
