Citizens are waiting for the test at the screening clinic at Juan Station in Incheon on the morning of the 5th. [매경DB]Even after completing vaccinations and booster shots to prevent COVID-19, the number of cases infected with the Omicron mutation is increasing, raising anxiety.
According to foreign media reports such as Reuters on the 17th (local time), a research team at Stellenbosch University in South Africa published the results of a study of 7 German cases infected with Omicron between last month and early this month while visiting Cape Town, South Africa.
The research team confirmed that all seven infected people were confirmed to be Omicron 1 to 2 months after they finished the booster shot. Five of them completed the first and second doses and booster shots with Pfizer vaccine. The other was confirmed to have received the Pfizer vaccine for the first and second doses and the Moderna vaccine for the booster shot. The remaining one received the AstraZeneca vaccine for the first time, and the Pfizer vaccine for the second dose and Booster Shot.
They are all between the ages of 25 and 39, and have never been infected with COVID-19 before Omicron. They also showed mild symptoms after being infected with the Omicron mutation, and were not admitted to the hospital.
Wolfgang Fraser, a professor at Stellenbosch University, said, “Even if you boost your immunity with booster shots, you can become infected with Omicron and show disease symptoms.”
The Guardian also reported on the 12th (local time) that at a restaurant in Oslo, Norway, on the 26th of last month, 111 guests who had received the second dose of vaccination attended a Christmas party, and 80 of them were group infected. So far, 17 of them have been confirmed to have been infected with Omicron.
The Corona 19 confirmed person, who requested anonymity, told The Guardian, “Four people, including three acquaintances who completed the second vaccination and one acquaintance who received a booster shot, spent the weekend together, and we all tested positive for COVID-19.” Two of them were confirmed by the authorities as Omicron,” he said.
Another person explained, “16 to 18 people who attended the 60th birthday party tested positive for Omicron as a result of the PCR test.
Until the second round of vaccination, some even received a booster shot, but there are recent cases of breakthrough infection confirmed by Corona 19 after attending a group meeting.
Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London, said: “Certainly we are seeing more breakthrough cases compared to the delta mutation. It had less transmission power than that),” he pointed out.
In fact, recent studies have shown that Omicron exhibits ‘significant’ substrates that can evade vaccine protection.
On the 11th, in the international scientific journal ‘Emgerging Microbes & Infection’, the results of a study by the National Food and Drug Administration (NIFDC) of China that people infected with Omicron avoid vaccine or immune protection from infection were reported. has been published
“Omicron poses a new challenge in the fight against COVID-19,” said Youchun Wang, senior researcher at NIFDC.
Researcher Wang continued, “As a result of comparing the serum samples from patients in the convalescent phase of COVID-19 with ‘VOCs’ such as alpha, beta, gamma, and delta, and ‘variants of interest (VOI)’ such as lambda and mu, Omicron was infected with COVID-19. “Omicron will evade immunity even more, as the antibody protection from past infections or vaccinations decreases progressively over 6 months.” It can significantly boost immunity (against other mutations), but protection from omicron seems jeopardized.”
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that Omicron was first reported in Botswana last month and has spread to 63 countries as of the 9th of this month, but the symptoms are still relatively mild.
The American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Immunization Advisory Committee (ACIP), with the unanimous opinion of all 15 advisors, recommended that Pfizer or Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine be used rather than Janssen’s vaccine. This is because the Janssen vaccine has been reported to cause thrombocytopenic thrombosis with a low probability. In the United States, blood clots occurred in 54 of the Janssen vaccine recipients, and at least nine of them died.
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