For all those, who are happy that the Omicron may not be that severe, there is bad news. The now-dominant strain that has engulfed the world may cause less severe disease, but more than 50,000-300,000 Americans can die over a period of time which can extend up to March. These projections have been released lately.
The Omicron Variant May Not Be Mild As Per Forecast
The infectious nature of the variant more than makes it up for its less-severe hit. Since mid -November, the number of deaths has been on an upswing in the U.S., and this trend does not seem to slow down one bit.
New infections have peaked in certain regions in the U.S. and are averaging around 800,000 cases a day. It is more than three times in number if one compares these figures to the ones about a year ago.
However, the main problem remains that hospitals will be stretched to the core. There are around 15,000 patients in hospitals at present. If the trend continues, then the U.S. could see more deaths coming in by springtime. A South Florida epidemiologist has said that there could be more deaths if the trend continues in this manner.
Some of the teams working on various pandemic models are of the opinion that there could be more deaths in the U.S. in the times to come at the end of January and at the beginning of February.
Currently, New York is the third state to report a high number of Covid-19 cases, since 2020 according to an analysis by John Hopkins University data. Hawaii and Vermont have also crossed their 2020 numbers.
According to recent data, the WHO has also come out with reported that vaccination drives have not been successful lately. And that may have led to the surge in infection numbers.
Dr. Tedros from WHO says that the variant may be causing fewer problems in the vaccinated, it is not so in the unvaccinated. If recent trends are to be reflected upon, it is causing a massive number of hospitalizations in people across the globe.
The cases are so quick to arise, that healthcare systems across the world are getting overwhelmed. In France, too, hospitalizations are increasing in numbers. The French health minister further added that January could be a bad month for hospitals.
The trend shows that most Omicron patients are occupying the general beds in hospitals, while the Delta patients occupy the ICUs.
Serbia’s president has also made similar statements and has said that the hospital infrastructure is under huge pressure due to a surge in the number of Omicron infections. The country recorded more than 9,000 cases last week on a single day.
In his recent request, Dr. Tedros has said that all the countries should get together to make vaccination a necessity for all. This applies to the poorer countries as well, where less than 10% have currently got vaccinated.
He also gave out figures, that showed that almost 109 countries have missed the deadline to achieve 70% vaccination by this time since the pandemic started. Last year, the WHO had said that there will be enough vaccines to vaccinate the entire adult population by July 2022. However, that seems like a distant dream at present.
However, the main problem remains that developed countries are hoarding vaccines for booster programs, which seems to lead to a shortage.
In the recent spate of events to rock the world, Hong Kong plans to kill around 2,000 small animals amidst reports of them testing positive for the virus. An employee of the concerned pet store, where these results came to the fore, also showed high positivity.
