Omicron’s new XBB subvariant has now accounted for 71 cases across a few states, with Maharashtra reporting its first five infections on Thursday, joining West Bengal, Odisha, and Tamil Nadu on the list. Odisha reported 33 cases in a fortnight, followed by Bengal (17) and Tamil Nadu (16), according to reports.
Since August, the XBB strain, also known as BA.2.10, has been detected in several countries including Australia, Bangladesh, Denmark, India, Japan, and the United States.
While the number of cases in Singapore has increased, the health ministry says there is still no evidence of the subvariant causing a severe outcome. Because the WHO designated Omicron as a “variant of concern,” its offspring and second-generation variants are being treated similarly.
In India, scientists involved in genome sequencing told the Times of India on Thursday that BA.2.75 was responsible for approximately 88% of new infections, while the XBB subvariant was responsible for approximately 7% of all cases. The prevalence of BA.5 in samples is now less than 5%.
“The XBB is another hybrid version of Omicron. We are closely monitoring its spread in Maharashtra,” Dr Rajesh Karyakarte, state coordinator for genome sequencing told the Times of India.
XBB is currently dominating all other Omicron sub-variants in Singapore. Karyakarte further said XBB has been found in many parts of the world, but it is spreading rapidly in Singapore. Within three weeks, it had grown to account for more than half of all daily cases there, he added.
What are the Variant’s Characteristics?
The XBB strain, also known as BA.2.10, evolved from the BA.2 Omicron subvariant strain.
“The XBB variant is the latest in a series of variants that have emerged in countries with high vaccination rates,” Dr Paul Tambyah, president of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection told news publication Today.
He went on to say that the virus’s ability to avoid immunisation is a natural result of its evolution. “Over time, all viruses evolve and become more transmissible and less virulent,” Dr Tambyah explained.
The new variant is the result of an accumulation of changes in the virus’s spike surface protein, Dr Sebastian Maurer-Stroh, director of A*Star’s Bioinformatics Institute, was quoted as saying in the report.
Is it Dangerous?
“Although we do not have all the genomic data on the current wave of cases, that (XBB being more infectious compared to other variants) is most likely the case as the number of infections has risen quite significantly over the last few weeks,” Dr Tambyah said, according to the report.
And Dr. Leong Hoe Nam of Rophi Clinic, an infectious disease expert pointed out that the fact that it has become the leading virus in Singapore shows that it can outrun and outdo the other strains. “Like how Omicron replaced Delta, but much faster,” he explained.
“So far, it doesn’t seem to be leading to worse outcomes. Hospitalisation numbers are slowly going up, as we would expect with more cases, but so far, the growth in severe outcomes seems slower than the growth in cases,” Associate Professor Alex Cook, vice-dean of research at the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, was quoted as saying.
Because of the combination of mutations from other strains, the new strain is “probably the most immune-evasive yet,” Raj Rajnarayanan, a professor at the New York Institute of Technology’s Jonesboro, Ark., told the Fortune. A preprint study published on Oct. 4 by Peking University and Changping Laboratory discovered that XBB had the greatest ability to evade antibody protections among newly emerging variants.
Monoclonal antibody treatments may also be less effective against newer variants such as XBB and BA.2.75.2, according to experts. “We’ve never seen this type of immune evasion before,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP).
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