Being punished for detecting new Covid variant: SA on travel curbs
It’s potentially more dangerous than the one that has fuelled infections
Johannesburg, Nov. 27: South Africa said on Saturday it was being punished for its advanced ability to detect new Covid-19 variants early, as travel bans and restrictions imposed because of the new Omicron variant threaten to harm tourism and other sectors of the economy.
South Africa has some of the world’s top epidemiologists and scientists, who have managed to detect emerging coronavirus variants and their mutations early on in their life cycle. The Omicron variant was first discovered in South Africa and has since been detected in Belgium, Botswana, Israel and Hong Kong.
“This latest round of travel bans is akin to punishing South Africa for its advanced genomic sequencing and the ability to detect new variants quicker,” the Ministry of International Relations and Cooperation said.
“Excellent science should be applauded and not punished,” it said in a statement.
Many nations rushed on Friday and Saturday to announce travel curbs to South Africa and other countries in the region.
The foreign ministry noted that while the new variant was also detected in other countries, the global reaction to those countries have been “starkly different” to
cases in southern Africa.
The new variant was first announced on Wednesday by a team of scientists in South Africa who said they had detected a variant that could possibly evade the body’s immune response and make it more transmissible. On Friday the World Health Organisation named it Omicron and designated it as a “variant of concern” — its most serious level — saying preliminary evidence suggests an increased risk of reinfection.
Brussels, Nov. 27: Nearly two years into the Covid-19 pandemic, the world has raced to contain a new Coronavirus variant potentially more dangerous than the one that has fuelled relentless waves of infection on nearly every continent.
A World Health Organisation panel named the variant “Omicron” and classified it as a highly transmissible virus of concern, the same category that includes the predominant Delta variant, which is still a scourge driving higher cases of sickness and death in Europe and parts of the United States.
“It seems to spread rapidly,” US President Joe Biden said of the new variant, only a day after celebrating the resumption of Thanksgiving gatherings for millions of American families and the sense that normal life was coming back at least for the vaccinated.
In announcing new travel restrictions, he told reporters, “I’ve decided that we’re going to be cautious.” Omicron’s actual risks are not understood. But early evidence suggests it carries an increased risk of reinfection compared with other highly transmissible variants, the WHO said. That means people who contracted Covid-19 and recovered could be subject to catching it again.
It could take weeks to know if current vaccines are less effective against it. In response to the variant’s discovery in southern Africa, the United States, Canada, Russia and a host of other countries joined the European Union in restricting travel for visitors from that region, where the variant brought on a fresh surge of infections. The White House said the US will restrict travel from South Africa and seven other countries in the region beginning Monday. —