Omicron: The latest news

The public reaction to new Covid-19 variants has followed a familiar cycle. People tend to assume the worst about two different questions — whether the variant leads to faster transmission of the Covid virus and whether it causes more severe illness among infected people.

The first of those worries came true with the Alpha and Delta variants: Alpha was more contagious than the original version of the virus, and Delta was even more contagious than Alpha. But the second of the worries has largely not been borne out: With both Alpha and Delta, the percentage of Covid cases that led to hospitalization or death held fairly steady.

This pattern isn’t surprising, scientists say. Viruses often evolve in ways that help them flourish. Becoming more contagious allows a virus to do so; becoming more severe has the potential to do the opposite, because more of a virus’s hosts can die before they infect others.

It is too soon to know whether the Omicron variant will fit the pattern. But the very early evidence suggests that it may. Unfortunately, Omicron seems likely to be more contagious than Delta, including among vaccinated people. Fortunately, the evidence so far does not indicate that Omicron is causing more severe illness:

• Barry Schoub, a South African virologist who advises the government there, has said that Omicron cases have tended to be “mild to moderate.” Schoub added: “That’s a good sign. But let me stress it is early days.”

• Dr. Rudo Mathivha, the head of the intensive care unit at a hospital in Soweto, South Africa, said that severe cases have been concentrated among people who were not fully vaccinated.

• Dr. Sharon Alroy-Preis, a top health official in Israel, emphasized yesterday that when vaccinated people were infected, they became only slightly ill, according to the publication Haaretz.

• As The Times’s Carl Zimmer wrote, “For now, there’s no evidence that Omicron causes more severe disease than previous variants.”

In the initial days after a new variant is discovered, I know that many people focus on worst-case scenarios. The alarming headlines can make it seem as if the pandemic may be about to start all over again, with vaccines powerless to stop the variant.

To be clear, there is genuine uncertainty about Omicron. Maybe it will prove to be worse than the very early signs suggest and cause more severe illness than Delta. But assuming the worst about each worrisome new variant is not a science-based, rational response. And alarmism has its own costs, especially to mental health, notes Dr. Raghib Ali, an epidemiologist at the University of Cambridge.

“Of course we should take it seriously,” Ali wrote on Twitter, “but there is no plausible scenario that this variant is going to take us back to square one (i.e. the situation pre-vaccines).”

Absent new evidence, the rational assumption is that Covid is likely to remain overwhelmingly mild among the vaccinated (unless their health is already precarious). For most vaccinated people, Covid probably presents less risk than some everyday activities.

On “Meet the Press” yesterday, Dr. Anthony Fauci emphasized the continuing power of vaccination, even against variants. “It may not be as good in protecting against initial infection,” Fauci said, “but it has a very important impact on diminishing the likelihood that you’re going to get a severe outcome from it.”

Katelyn Jetelina, an epidemiologist, made a similar point in her Substack newsletter this weekend:

Do not take Omicron lightly, but don’t abandon hope either. Our immune systems are incredible.

None of this changes what you can to do right now: Ventilate spaces. Use masks. Test if you have symptoms. Isolate if positive. Get vaccinated. Get boosted.

Government leaders can take an additional step, though: Improve global vaccine distribution. Variants are more likely to emerge in places with low vaccination rates, and less than 10 percent of people are vaccinated in many parts of Africa. (Look up the rate for any country.)

This weekend, Andy Slavitt, a former Covid adviser to President Biden, called for “the mass shipment of hundreds of millions of vaccines” to southern Africa.

More on Omicron

• South Africa — one of the early places where Omicron was detected — has had enough Covid vaccines to inoculate much of the population. But only 35 percent of adults are fully vaccinated, partly because of mistrust in the medical system stemming from the AIDS epidemic, Zeynep Tufekci, a Times columnist, writes.

• Researchers are testing how the vaccines respond to the variant and could have results in a few weeks.

• Japan, Israel and Morocco have closed their borders to foreign travelers.

THE LATEST NEWS

Politics

• China is developing advanced weapons, leading U.S. officials to push for the first nuclear talks between the two countries.

• Mark Esper sued the Pentagon, accusing it of improperly blocking parts of his memoir about his tenure as defense secretary under Donald Trump.

• Matthew McConaughey said that for now, he wouldn’t run for governor of Texas.

Other Big Stories

• The fashion designer Virgil Abloh, whose work bridged streetwear and the luxury world, died at 41.

• Xiomara Castro, the opposition candidate in Honduras’s presidential election, was leading in initial results. She would be the first woman to lead the country.

• As the U.S. hunts for Chinese spies, some scholars, scientists and others have asked if it has gone too far in targeting academics.

• After dozens of people watched an Oasis cover band, a snowstorm stranded them in a remote English pub for days.

Opinions

Margaret Renkl writes that she doesn’t need to test her dog’s DNA. “How would knowing Rascal’s breed mix help me understand this unique little weirdo we’ve adopted?”

The feminist movement needs pro-life people, Tish Harrison Warren argues in The Times.

MORNING READS

The woman on the bridge: Police and prosecutors chased a domestic violence case for years. Would it be enough?

Language: A French dictionary included a new pronoun: “iel.” It created an uproar.

It’s always sunny: Rob McElhenney is embarking on “the second half” of his career.

A Times classic: Why you procrastinate. It’s not because you’re lazy.

Lives Lived: Bon Appétit called Sylvia Weinstock “the Leonardo da Vinci of wedding cakes.” Her elaborate creations graced the tables of Kennedys, Kardashians and other celebrities. Weinstock died at 91.

ARTS AND IDEAS

Spotlight on Miami’s art scene

Art Basel returns to Miami Beach this week. The annual event, which also has shows in Switzerland and Hong Kong, is a big deal — ARTnews calls it “the world’s most important modern and contemporary art fair.” The area will host hundreds of galleries, along with satellite art fairs, pop-up shows and celebrity-studded private dinners.

Miami’s moment: The area’s art scene is thriving, Brett Sokol writes in The Times. Several new museums are in the works, and gallery sales boomed as collectors and tech entrepreneurs left the Northeast and West Coast during the pandemic.

A new era: Expect “clear skies with a virtual storm of NFTs,” The Miami Herald writes. There will be an array of gatherings centered on the emerging technology, including a daylong conference, NFT BZL. (At one interactive exhibit, visitors will be able to make an AI self-portrait and take it home as an NFT.)

If you’re in the area: Time Out has a roundup of public works on display this week, including a massive, multisensory labyrinth sculpture. — Claire Moses, a Morning writer

PLAY, WATCH, EAT

What to Cook

Make midnight pasta with roasted garlic and chile.

Child Stars

A chat with the young actors starring in some of this year’s biggest films, including “C’mon C’mon,” “Belfast,” and “King Richard.”

What to Watch

“Drive My Car,” directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, is about grief, love, work and the soul-sustaining power of art. Manohla Dargis calls it a “quiet masterpiece.”

What to Read

In his novel “Harsh Times,” the Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa examines power and conspiracy at a crucial point in Latin American history.

Now Time to Play

The pangram from Friday’s Spelling Bee was backing. Here is today’s puzzle — or you can play online.

Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Notion (four letters).

If you’re in the mood to play more, find all our games here.

Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — David

P.S. The word “yassify” — from a Twitter account that applies beauty filters to famous images — recently appeared in The Times for the first time.

Here’s today’s print front page.

“The Daily” is about the Arbery case. And on “Sway,” Kara Swisher talks with Emily Ratajkowski.

Claire Moses, Tom Wright-Piersanti, Ashley Wu and Sanam Yar contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at [email protected].

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