A gas station attendant stands next to a newspaper headline. The new variant of omicron has spread from South Africa to parts of Europe and Hong Kong.
Denis Farrell.
The World Health Organization declared a new strain of COVID-19 a variant of concern on Friday. The pharmaceutical industry plans to address the coronaviruses curve ball.
The new variant of the vaccine requires higher doses of booster shots, new boosters that anticipate strain changes, and omicron-specific boosters.
Moderna said in a statement to NPR that it has been working on a comprehensive strategy to predict variant of concern. The booster should be doubled from 50 to 100 micrograms. The vaccine maker has been studying two booster vaccines that are designed to anticipate the omicron variant. The company said it will ramp up efforts to make a booster candidate that specifically targets omicron.
"From the beginning, we have said that as we seek to defeat the epidemic, it is imperative that we are proactive as the virus grows," said Stéphane Bancel, CEO of Moderna. The Omicron variant is concerning and we have been moving quickly to address it.
Pfizer and BioNTech expect more data to be collected within two weeks. They will be able to determine whether or not they need to modify their vaccine. If needed, a vaccine tailored for the omicron variant could be ready to ship in 100 days.
In a statement sent to NPR, Johnson & Johnson said that it is testing its vaccine's efficacy against the new variant.
The WHO said the variant was first reported in November. The variant poses an increased risk for reinfection due to the large number of genes. Since early summer, health care systems in South Africa have been pushed to the max due to cases from the delta variant. The WHO reported that omicron infections have been on the rise recently.
There are more concerning omicron cases across the globe. The United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Belgium, Israel, and Hong Kong have all had cases confirmed.
Air travel restrictions from South Africa and seven other countries will go into effect on Monday after President Joe Biden implemented a new set of restrictions. One of the busiest travel periods of the year was announced by the president on the day after Thanksgiving.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the chief medical advisor to the president, Dr. Anthony Fauci, are more or less in agreement with Thanksgiving get-togethers for Americans who have been vaccine-free. More than 53 million people were expected to travel for Thanksgiving, an 18% increase compared to last year, according to an American Automobile Association travel forecast.
No cases of the omicron variant have been found in the United States according to the CDC. Fauci said on Saturday that he would not be surprised if the variant is already here.
"We have not detected it yet, but when you have a virus that is showing this degree of transmissibility and you're already having travel-related cases that they've noted in Israel and Belgium and other places, it almost invariably is going to go all over."
The CDC is predicting that there will be more cases of coronaviruses over the next four weeks as Americans prepare to transition from one busy holiday to the next. The country is projected to surpass 800,000 deaths by Christmas, according to the tracker.
