Ruminations: Living with COVID-19

"[Omicron's reduced severity] will make the goal of living with COVID-19 in the absence of socially and economically disruptive public health interventions substantially easier to achieve at the current time."
Research study, Imperial College London

"Interestingly, how much severity is reduced varies by age, with the greatest reduction in severity seen in 50- to 70-year-olds, and a smaller reduction in younger and older age groups."
"[The latest analysis showing a substantial drop in severity] has undoubtedly made it easier for countries to end pandemic restrictions than might otherwise have been the case."
Neil Ferguson, research author

"[BA.2 is 30 percent more transmissible] and more when you add in lack of restrictions and waning immunity."
"Fortunately, it's not more virulent, and three shots protect well [against hospitalization]."
Eric Topol, founder, director, Scripps Research Translational Institute

"Does this mean Omicron is severe for kids? Not necessarily."
"In young kids, hospitalization doesn't always equal more severe disease, as the threshold for admission is low."
Meaghan Kall, epidemiologist, report author

This was a massive study where over one and a half million COVID infections in England provided "clear evidence", according to its authors, that Omicron is not as deadly as the previous mutated strain that roared through the world community -- Delta. Evidence, according to the British scientists behind the study, that supports the case for COVID restrictions being dropped.

Omicron was seen to have a 59 percent lower risk of hospitalization along with a 69 percent reduction of dying in comparison to those people who were infected with Delta. At the same time the risk among the unvaccinated was significantly higher for hospitalization. The risk of ending up in hospital was 70 percent lower, however, even among the unvaccinated, with the risk of death 80 percent lower, infected with Omicron in comparison to unvaccinated people infected with Delta.

Leading researchers to state with conviction that the Omicron variant is intrinsically less severe than its predecessor. Infection breakthroughs saw vaccines somewhat less effective at keeping people out of hospital in comparison to Delta breakthrough cases. Those who were boosted with a third shot were the most protected from hospitalization and death; at 80 percent less likely to be admitted to hospital or to die from their infection, compared to the unvaccinated

When Omicron was beginning to surge in November, Imperial College researchers felt no evidence existed to credibly prove that Omicron was less deadly than Delta and that its capacity to elude some level of protection from a previous infection or vaccination could mean a "major, imminent threat to public health" was posed by Omicron, based on early and limited data available at the time.

A substantial drop in severity has now reversed that early data according to the latest analysis. Despite which the assurance comes with no guarantee that a future variant will not end up being more virulent. The BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron itself now driving record case counts and deaths in some areas is on the cusp of becoming more dominant. And more must be learned about its virulence potential. It is seen to be 30 percent more transmissible.

An analysis separate to this latest study published in The Lancet, by the U.K. Health Security Agency, found no evidence that people infected with BA.2 are more likely to be hospitalized. Only adults had significantly reduced risk of ending up in hospital with Omicron as compared to Delta cases in The Lancet study. The risk of hospitalization among children under age ten, was similar where both variants were involved.