Two studies indicate reduced risk of Omicron hospitalization but WHO says too soon to evaluate severity

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Wed, 2021-12-22 17:28 — mike kraft

Early studies suggest a reduced risk of Covid-19 hospitalization when infected with Omicron compared to Delta --CNN overview

(CNN) Two new preprint papers add to the growing evidence that the Omicron coronavirus variant may be less likely to cause severe disease and hospitalization compared to the Delta variant.

Omicron is associated with a two-thirds reduction in the risk of Covid-19 hospitalization compared with Delta, suggests one study, released online Wednesday as a working paper by researchers at the University of Edinburgh in the United Kingdom. That research was based out of Scotland.

The other paper, posted Tuesday to the online server medrxiv.org, suggests that people with Omicron infections have had 80% lower odds of being admitted to the hospital compared with Delta infections. But once a patient was hospitalized, there was no difference in the risk of severe disease, according to that research, based out of South Africa. ...

Too soon to decide if Omicron more severe than Delta, WHO says The World Health Organization does not yet have enough data on the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus to say if it is more severe than the Delta variant, an official said on Wednesday, almost a month after South Africa first raised the alarm about its emergence. Reuters Reuters

Dec 22 (Reuters) - The World Health Organization does not yet have enough data on the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus to say if it is more severe than the Delta variant, an official said on Wednesday, almost a month after South Africa first raised the alarm about its emergence.

"We do have some data suggesting that rates of hospitalisation are lower," WHO's technical lead on COVID-19, Maria van Kerkhove, said in a briefing with media.

"We do have some data suggesting that rates of hospitalisation are lower," WHO's technical lead on COVID-19, Maria van Kerkhove, said in a briefing with media. But she cautioned against drawing conclusions from the early data because "we have not seen this variant circulate long enough in populations around the world, certainly in vulnerable populations". ...

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