New Subvariant BA.2 More Contagious But Potentially Less Severe Than Omicron, New Research Says
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- There's a new subvariant of omicron that's circulating and it appears to be more infectious than the original, according to new research. Researchers say the new COVID-19 variant is more contagious but potentially less serious than omicron, which is responsible for the latest surge in cases.
It's called BA.2, a subvariant of omicron -- first detected in mid-November and now identified in at least 49 countries, including the United States.
"What we are seeing is, are countries like Denmark, which are weeks ahead of the United States in dealing with omicron as a whole, you're seeing a significant rise," CBS News medical contributor Dr. David Agus said.
While overall COVID-19 cases continue to drop, health officials worry the new variant could drag out this omicron surge.
"We're keeping a very close eye on it," Dr. Anthony Fauci said. "Looks a bit more transmissible, but not necessarily more severe."
Like the more familiar version of omicron, BA.2 has a large number of changes -- about 20 -- concentrated in the spike protein, the part of the virus that's targeted by vaccines.
"Does it evade our immune system? Does it evade the immunity we've acquired from omicron infection or the vaccines? Most of the evidence so far, it's preliminary, suggests it doesn't," former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb said.
A report from the U.K. suggests current vaccines protect about as well against this subvariant, with better protection against symptoms -- an average of about 70% -- two weeks after a booster.
"The only thing I feel pretty confident in is that we'll have more variants," Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, said. "We'll have future variants, so let's begin to prepare."
Like with other variants, the best protection remains vaccination and boosters.
"So whenever the next variant hits, we're going to be ready, we won't have to shut down schools, we won't have to shut down our lives," Jha said. "We'll manage our way through it."
The new research says vaccinated people don't spread this new variant as easily as the unvaccinated, and people who are boosted are even less likely to transmit it.