Vaccines are effective against new omicron sub-variants driving a surge in Covid-19 cases in South Africa, the head of the World Health Organisation said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s too soon to know whether these new sub-variants can cause more severe disease than other omicron sub-variants, but early data suggest vaccination remains protective against severe disease and death,\u201d Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said at a media briefing in Geneva Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Scientists in South Africa and Botswana discovered omicron late last year and South Africa was the first country to experience a major surge of infections as a result of the variant. Now BA.4 and BA.5, two omicron sub-variants, are driving a new spike in cases in South Africa.<\/p>\n
Global deaths due to Covid-19 have fallen to the lowest levels since March 2020, with about 15,000 fatalities last week, according to the WHO.<\/p>\n
Still, Tedros urged that countries and health systems continue to test and track the virus to help identify new mutations.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn many countries we\u2019re essentially blind to how the virus is mutating. We don\u2019t know what\u2019s coming next,\u201d Tedros said.<\/p>\n