Africa Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, on Thursday, said the Omicron BA.2 sub-variant of COVID-19 appeared to be more infectious than the original BA.1 sub-variant.
Head of the Africa CDC, Dr John Nkengasong, said it did not cause more severe disease, citing data from South Africa.
He said, “South Africa is reporting that it is more transmissible than the BA.1 variant, but interestingly and very encouragingly the severity seems to be the same.’’
South Africa was one of the first countries to detect the Omicron variant of COVID-19, which had since swept around the globe and become dominant in most places.
Although South Africa was well over the peak of its Omicron wave, its daily number of new infections has stabilised around 3,000 per day, a higher level than that seen at the tail end of previous waves of COVID-19 infections.
Nkengasong said the trend might be linked to the BA.2 sub-variant, but did not elaborate.
(NAN)