United States: The new variant of COVID-19 is believed to be less responsive against the current vaccines available in the market against the infection, and now the impact of the new variant has been monitored and surveyed by Oregon health officials.
The new strain KP.2 has been nicknamed as FLiRT because of its mutations and now the variant is responsible for around 28 percent of the cases in the United States, linked to SARS-CoV-2 virus.
According to the health authorities, the concerns have heightened after the number of COVID-19 hospitalizations reached up to 106 after touching new low 79 in late April. The surge in the cases have been reported during the first week of May when the FLiRT varirant became prevalent.
While addressing the concern, the medical director for communicable disease and immunizations at the Oregano Health Authority – Paul Cieslak, stated, “It remains to be seen whether we’ll be seeing more disease from this KP.2 variant. We’ll just have to watch the data and see,” as reported by kgw.com.
However, he further highlighted that the COVID test positivity rate is relatively low at 3.5 percent, which earlier was 11.7 percent in January and 15 percent in September.
New COVID variant and effect of vaccination against the same!
The health expert underlined that the currently available vaccines are very less effective against the latest FLiRT variant. According to him, previous strains have been compared with the current strain.
However, he highlighted that getting vaccinated is crucial and no one should skip a dose, especially during such a critical time.
Cieslak addressed the concern, stating, “Remember that these strains are all Omicron strains; they’re all reasonably closely related. This one does seem a little bit different and can evade a little bit better — but nevertheless, the immunity against severe disease seems to have held pretty well. And certainly, if you’ve been vaccinated recently,” as reported by kgw.com.
In addition to this, he also recommended that the public should receive the new COVID-19 vaccine – after it will be available in fall. He outlined that getting the future jab will be important, similar to getting an annual flu shot, especially for those who are immunocompromised.
According to the reports by kgw.com, “COVID is down. We’re happy to see that — but it’s not out. It’s still circulating,” said Cieslak.