The jolt of Omicron
🌐 Making sense of the latest twist in the pandemic plot.
📢 This is our last post for the year—WorldWise and I are going on a short break. See you in January! ❄️
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Analysis and global perspectives in health, development, planet.
It was a false sense of predictability.
The pandemic section of our weekly Briefings was dwindling into a lull. Delta had kept its dominant position among virus variants for some time. Each country and region kept focused on its own pandemic trajectory and response, bar various attempts to pave the way for better global distribution of vaccines. And it seemed that recovery was underway for parts of the world that managed to muscle their way to the front of the vaccine-supply queue.
Almost overnight, things changed—again.
The 15th letter of the Greek alphabet is now a household name. Omicron, or variant B.1.1529, came on the scene with initial evidence suggesting a high risk of reinfection.
In the last post of this year let’s weigh up what we know and expect, taking in the latest reports from this week.
THE RISK AT A GLANCE
The discovery of Omicron raised red flags because it carries an unusually high level of mutations—more than 30, many on the spike protein it uses to invade healthy cells. What they mean for spread of the virus and severity of the disease is a gradual reveal.
As the first datasets get released, we see stronger indications that the variant can evade the body's immune responses more easily than previous versions of the virus, which means it can infect people who have been vaccinated or contracted Covid before.
It follows that as the risk of reinfection rises, cases surge—and in turn, just by virtue of the numbers, so do the severe cases that might lead to hospitalisation or death.
Even highly effective vaccines appear to do worse in protecting against Omicron, although the latest evidence suggests they can prevent severe disease. Pfizer’s messaging of booster benefits has almost buried reports that protection from two doses of its vaccine drops substantially with this variant—to as low as 33% by some reports. That third dose does work as a top-up, though.
But there are reasons to stay positive. Early data are reinforcing initial suspicions that the symptoms caused by Omicron are milder, leading to fewer hospitalisations than expected—though this is based on data from South Africa, where young people make up most early cases. Our immune systems are no longer completely naïve. The drugs we have should still work, and even if vaccines need a top-up or a tweak, there's now the infrastructure to do so relatively fast. Plus, we've caught it early.
Selected sources: NYT + Atlantic + CIDRAP + Sensemaker + Insight by Zeynep Tufecki + WaPo + STAT + Economist + Reuters + Guardian + MIT Tech Review + BBC Devex + Nature
WHERE IN THE WORLD
Omicron was identified by scientists in South Africa, where cases have been rising in recent weeks, and Devex reports that it's thought to have evolved inside a patient with a chronic infection in Botswana.
Since those early detections, it's been confirmed in dozens of countries—more than 70 at the time of writing. It is expected to become the dominant variant very fast, and early signs from South Africa appear to confirm this.
But bear in mind that capacity and speed of detection varies massively across the world. South Africa is a case in point: it sequences the genomes of less than 1% of its coronavirus samples. So we can't even be certain, at this point, that southern Africa is the origin.
On that note: reports from the Netherlands signal that it likely spread in Europe before those first reports appeared. There are also conflicting views as to how it evolved. Some believe an animal host is the most likely explanation, while others favour the theory that it acquired its many mutations while incubating in an immunocompromised person.
Selected sources: BBC + Economist + Devex + Guardian + Bloomberg + Guardian + DW + NYT + Sensemaker + WaPo + NYT + WaPo + NPR + VOA + CIDRAP + CBS + STAT Science + Vox + Guardian + LA Times
ECONOMIC HIT
There's been a lot of talk about what might be in store for the pandemic trajectory since Omicron made its appearance. And whatever the specifics, the economic impact appears to be almost inescapable. Recovery may be on the cards in many places, but it's fragile and vulnerable to another global wave of Covid-19 regardless of disease severity.
Tourism is a case in point. The pandemic is expected to cost the tourism industry US$2 trillion in lost revenue this year, a figure that's on par with 2020, according to the UN's World Tourism Organization. Countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, where tourism accounts for 20% of the GDP across the region, are suffering because of the economic slowdown. Another example is Indonesia: despite opening its borders to international travellers six weeks ago, only 153 people have applied for a tourist visa.
Countries with poor resources—and low vaccination rates—are likely to suffer the most. South Africa and other nations in the region have been an early target of travel bans that hurt local economies. Many more people may be pushed into poverty as a result.
And we know that the pandemic is not alone in pushing some countries to the brink. Climate change and conflict loom large. Together, the three crises are expected to cause a 17% jump in the number of people in need of aid next year, according to the UN. That's almost 275 million people.
Selected sources: NYT + Economist + New Scientist + Economist + Al Jazeera + DW + TRF + Quartz Africa + IFRC
‘WORSE THAN THE DISEASE’?
Early responses to the new variant—including the travel bans, now lifted by the UK at least—have been criticised for failing on coordination, information sharing and a solid evidence base.
More scientists in the Global North are now backing booster vaccinations despite the persisting vaccine inequality that raises the chances of new variants emerging. (Not that governments need that scientific backing to continue stockpiling for boosters.)
As many observers have pointed out, the response was particularly unfair to South Africa and other countries in the region. South African scientists did right to issue an early warning, and got punished with targeted travel bans in response. We know they do very little to reduce spread, whereas the impact on livelihoods and economies is often severe.
The problem is, of course, that the risks and benefits of travel bans don't sit on the same side of the border. Not immediately, anyway—but eventually, disruptions in cross-border movement do ripple out, as we saw with the supply-chain problems earlier in the pandemic.
The very presence of Omicron is symptomatic of exactly that kind of insular attitude to a global problem.
On that note, I leave you with a few stats:
More than 360 million booster shots have been administered around the world
Under 8 million of these are in lower-middle-income nations
Just 3.4% of people in low-income nations and 30% in lower-middle-income nations are considered fully vaccinated—by comparison, in the UK it’s 70%
Just 7.1% of people in low-income countries have received at least 1 dose
WHO now forecasts that Africa won’t reach 70% vaccination coverage until August 2024
Selected sources: NYT + Sensemaker + Nature + Al Jazeera + STAT + Our World in Data + WaPo + WHO Africa
Briefing Highlights
TREND TO WATCH
Awareness seems to be growing of how consumers and policies outside the Amazon are driving deforestation in this part of Brazil. Three recent reports are indicative. One documents that demand in the US state of California is responsible for consumption of about half of the oil extracted from the Amazon rainforest. Another documents that two US commodity trading companies have sourced soybeans from farmers trying to evict a traditional cattle-herding community, the Capao do Modesto people, from an area they have lived in for 200 years. And the third reports that a number of European supermarkets have dropped beef products linked to deforestation in Brazil.
UNDER THE RADAR
The food crisis in southern Madagascar is down to the combined effect of several factors including poverty, pandemic restrictions and variability in rainfall, not simply drought caused by climate change, according to a new study. Previous reports have said that Madagascar is facing one of the first climate-induced instances of famine.
Based on Briefings published December 7, November 30 & November 23
COVID-19 PANDEMIC
Peru has the world's highest COVID death rate. Here's why - NPR Goats & Soda
Cuba’s bet on home-grown COVID vaccines is paying off - Nature
Ivermectin may help Covid-19 patients, but only those with worms - Economist
Severe Covid infection doubles chances of dying in following year, study finds - Guardian
🎥 VISUAL | COVID orphans: A pandemic within a pandemic - Al Jazeera
HEALTH
Obese children will outnumber the underweight for the first time - Economist
Gavi decides to fund the rollout of world's first malaria vaccine - Devex
Antimicrobial effectiveness leaning towards ‘tipping point’ resistance - UN News
CLIMATE & ENVIRONMENT
How to ensure the COP26 forest declaration is a success - Alison Hoare in Chatham House
How Morocco went big on solar energy - BBC Future
How Bangladesh is beating the odds on climate disaster deaths - TNH
World Bank warns over looming plunge in Iraq water resources - France24
🎥 VISUAL | Dams and drought choke Syria’s water supply - Guardian
HUMANITARIAN & HUMAN RIGHTS
The number of children living in deadliest war zones rises 20 per cent to new high - Save the Children
Warnings of worrying rise in northwest Syria suicide rate among women – TNH
The migrant workers who follow climate disasters - New Yorker
🎥 VISUAL | The rising cost of the climate crisis in flooded South Sudan - Guardian
DEVELOPMENT & SOCIETY
More than a third of world’s population have never used internet, says UN - Guardian
Bridging Africa's digital divide: the rise of community internet - TRF
Afghanistan economic meltdown one of worst in history, UN says - FT
UN upgrades Nepal & Bangladesh to group of developing nations - Times of India
Why is the world protesting so much? A new study claims to have some answers - WaPo
From the week’s global soundtrack 🌐
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