Are we back to the lockdown era yet AGAIN? Korea, China & Israel Hit with a New Variant!
The world just got back to its feet and now the speculations say we are hit with the new variant of COVID19 again. After years of downfall, the world is seeing the graph of COVID hitting up again, particularly in the countries like China, Hong Kong, and Korea.
The pandemic does not seem to meet its end any time soon since more than 30 million people in China are in lockdown again and people in Hong Kong are running out of morgue spaces.
In recent times, the reports suggest that Israel has discovered new cases of the Deltacron, a new variant of the old COVID19. The new variant a.k.aDeltacron is a hybrid of the two sub-variants Delta variant and the Omicron variant of the COVID-19.
Looks like the era of Covid19 is not dying down any time soon, however, it has been taking different areas of the world under its effect. According to the study of WHO, The new variant is now moving towards the eastern area of Europe, such as Armenia, Belarus, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Russia.
Omicron in South Korea
According to the news reports, almost 600,000 coronavirus cases have been reported in South Korea on Thursday. The health officials have declared an emergency in the county and have concluded the country is near the pear of infection wave fueled with Omicron.
The WHO data shows, in the last seven days, South Korea comes on the top of the table of the most cases reported in a week with 2,417,174 cases. The second most cases were found in Vietnam with 1,776,045 cases.
New Variant in Israel
According to the Ministry of Israel, the country is yet to have any COVID19 related crises as they have reported only two cases of the new variant. The Israel Health Ministry is not really worried about this new variant as they have not been hit by it that much.
The two cases that have been reported in Israel were recorded while doing the PCR tests on the new passengers at Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport. It would not be wrong to say that the new variant was not recorded for someone who lived in Israel, it has traveled from other countries to Israel. Nevertheless, the Israel Health Ministry states that the situation currently is under their control and they have taken all the precautions to ensure the virus spread is not grave.
Who discovered the new variant? Or WHO discovered the new variant?
Now the question arises, who has recently discovered the new variant of the COVID19? It was WHO, who discovered that the new variant is again sabotaging the world with its effectiveness. Despite the countries reporting minimal cases of the COVID19.
According to WHO, since January, there has been a sudden downfall in the COVID19 cases in the whole world. However, in the last few months, there has been a sudden surge in coronavirus cases mainly in Europe and USA. There have been more than 11 million cases and almost 43,000 new deaths in the last few weeks due to the new variant of the Covid19.
The technical lead of WHO Maria Van Kerkhove discussed the upsurge in the COVID19 cases and said “despite a significant reduction in testing that is occurring worldwide”. Further, she added that the new variant of the coronavirus is still spreading and if proper measures are not taken we will again be in major lockdown which we economically cannot afford, she said “at a very intense level around the world”, indicating towards the spread of the new variant.
On the other hand, according to the chief of WHO Tedros Adhanom Ghenreyesus, the recent rise in the covid cases is because of the lack of visibility since the health ministers were not testing people much, he said: “the cases we are seeing are just the tip of the iceberg”. “We call on all countries to remain vigilant”, he warns the other countries as well to be prepared and further stresses “the pandemic is not over yet”.
Would the fourth shot be needed?
The research states that the fourth dose of the current mRNA covid19 vaccines has minimal benefits only even for the younger and the healthy adults. According to the study published in the New England Journal of Medicine which assessed almost 70 healthcare workers, they got a second booster shot of Moderna or Pfizer vaccines, four months righter after getting three shots of Pfizer, which in total makes the four shots.
Getting the fourth shot was concluded to be safe, and it further increased the receivers’ neutralizing antibodies, that can stop the new variant or even the old ones of the coronavirus from infecting the body to all the comparable levels of the aftermaths of the third dose before the antibodies started working in time. Further, the study suggested that the fourth dose can be more effective for the older and already sick people or the ones with comorbidities.