NEWS: according to the WHO Omicron “spreads faster than any variant of Covid-19.”

WHO says Omi­cron “is spread­ing at a faster rate than any vari­ant of Covid-19” ever
The World Health Orga­ni­za­tion has revealed that the Omi­cron vari­ant of the coro­n­avirus is spread­ing rapid­ly around the world.

Although the data has not yet explained whether this lat­est strain of Covid-19 is more dan­ger­ous or fatal, it is clear that its trans­mis­si­bil­i­ty is high.

WHO Direc­tor-Gen­er­al Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghe­breye­sus explained how Omi­cron has now been detect­ed in 77 coun­tries after being dis­cov­ered late last month.
“And the real­i­ty is that Omi­cron is prob­a­bly present in most coun­tries, although it has­n’t been detect­ed yet,” he said. “Omi­cron is spread­ing at a rate that we haven’t seen with any pre­vi­ous variant.”

The head of the health agency also told every­one that they need to take Omi­cron seri­ous­ly.
Ini­tial data from South Africa indi­cat­ed that the vari­ant might be “mild” com­pared to oth­er strains like Delta, but that should not mean that it should be tak­en lighter.

“We are con­cerned that peo­ple will view Omi­cron as being gen­tle,” said Dr Tedros. “Sure­ly we have learned by now that we under­es­ti­mate this virus at our peril.

“Even if Omi­cron caus­es less severe dis­ease, the large num­ber of cas­es could again over­whelm unpre­pared health systems. ”

It comes as a grim pre­dic­tion for New South Wales could soon see tens of thou­sands of coro­n­avirus cas­es every day.

The Aus­tralian state today lift­ed restric­tions for indi­vid­u­als, allow­ing unvac­ci­nat­ed res­i­dents to vis­it cafes, pubs and restaurants.

NSW Health Min­is­ter Brad Haz­zard has warned that as the state grad­u­al­ly opens up inter­nal­ly, nation­al­ly and inter­na­tion­al­ly, we could see many new cases.

“What they’re telling us is that by the end of Jan­u­ary, we could be look­ing at 25,000 cas­es of the virus every day,” he said.

“So that brings us to about 175,000 in a week — that’s a big dif­fer­ence from 1,360 today — which is already a cause for concern.

“Stay out­side if you can, wear these masks, get test­ed for viral symp­toms, and just watch out for your­self and the com­mu­ni­ty. Thank you.”

There are fears that Omi­cron is already wreak­ing hav­oc in the UK, with the strain account­ing for 20% of cur­rent cas­es in England.

UK Health Sec­re­tary Sajid Javid said there were more than 4,700 active Omi­cron cas­es, but the UK health agency pre­dicts the num­ber could be up to 20 times higher.

While New South Wales could have 25,000 cas­es a day, recent mod­el­ing pre­dict­ed there could be a mil­lion Omi­cron infec­tions in the UK by the end of the year.

The UK has rein­tro­duced restric­tions in an attempt to pre­vent the spread of the virus.

Data reveals Omi­cron vari­ant detect­ed in Nether­lands before Africa sound­ed the alarm.