Covid 19 Resources Center

COVID-19:

In China, the relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions has continued, including opening up of travel with lifting (from 8 January) of quarantine requirements for arrivals – although there will still be a requirement for pre-travel COVID testing.  Under the “category B” management of COVID-19, case data will only be published once a month, according to the China CDC on Tuesday.  Anecdotal reports of very high numbers of cases, hospitalisations, and deaths are quite consistent with recent forecasts. 

Phylogenetic analysis of the latest SARS-CoV-2 sequences from several Chinese regions reveals that the variants currently circulating in the country are the same as those seen circulating globally in the second half of 2022, particularly the Omicron sub-lineages BF.7 and BA.5.2. There is no evidence of a new variant. Nevertheless, several countries (including India, Japan, Italy, Malaysia, and now the USA) as well as Taiwan are implementing COVID-19 testing for travellers arriving from China. 

COVID-19:

The situation in China appears challenging with rising infection numbers after the abrupt relaxation of many restrictions - including releasing cities from lockdowns, people being able to quarantine at home on some occasions and not being required to present negative tests at public venues.  Current official case and death numbers are implausibly low.  It is not clear how severe the impact of the current wave will be, because China’s immune landscape in China is so different to anywhere else, but deaths are expected to increase in coming weeks as case numbers surge.  It is noted that while this carries risk of new variants, the different immune landscape in China reduces the likelihood of a new variant that is able to outcompete Omicron.  The Chinese situation is discussed in Nature here https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-04502-w

COVID-19:

General comments on COVID-19 (sources: YLE, Airfinity, Eric Topol “Ground Truths” and WHO)

Internationally, although the situation is variable, COVID-19 is in a generally increasing phase, thought to be based on: waning immunity;  behaviour (northern winter approaching with colder weather, more indoor gatherings, and abandoning mitigation measures); and variants.   

Cases reached a record high in China with restrictions being reduced in a few major cities now – Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen.  The current direction of the outbreak in China is somewhat unclear.  

Brazil’s wave continues (note the return of some mask mandates including aviation).

France’s uptick in cases can be linked to BQ.1.1 and low booster coverage, and earlier optimism about a drop in BQ.1 variants may have been falsely concluded because there was under-diagnosis due to a strike by staff of laboratories. 

COVID-19

It’s well over two weeks since the last update, and that is the longest interval between updates since COVID-19 began.  There has been a lot of information arriving, but often without a clear picture emerging. The WHO Director-General said last week the fact there had been a nearly 90% drop in weekly COVID-19 deaths globally (9400 last week, compared to 75000 weekly in February) provided cause for optimism, but still urged vigilance against the pandemic as variants continue to crop up. 

COVID-19:  WHO reports that new weekly COVID-19 cases and deaths globally have continued to decrease. There are early indications in North America of rising cases, following from Europe's recent wave.  Due to immune evading variants currently circulating and the drop in temperature driving changes to behaviour, a new wave is possible. In Asia, cases continue increasing in Indonesia, but have been falling in China, Singapore and Taiwan.  Note that China now has a number of cities with lockdowns imposed. 

Meanwhile it is postulated that the recent European wave, which was not severe, is NOT likely to have been driven by new immune-evading sub-variants.  This means that the effect of those variants may still be to come in Europe; France is predicted to become the first country to have the BQ.1.1 sub-variant dominate.  Spain is currently experiencing increasing cases (up 34% in a week) and death numbers.  Wastewater testing in Europe shows a mixed picture. Sources: Airfinity and various.

General update on COVID-19:

The peak of COVID-19 infections in many countries in Europe may be past, but numbers are increasing in some areas of Asia. The WHO is tracking more than 100 subvariants of Omicron, including BF.7, BA.2.75(.2), BQ.1(.1) and BA.4.6 now competing for dominance globally.  Two are currently winning the race: XBB and BQ.1.1. However, with changing behaviours and differences in immune histories (timing and nature of waves, vaccine and booster uptake), country-to-country comparisons are getting harder than ever. (Sources: Airfinity, YLE).

BQ.1.1 continues to predominate in Europe and North America, with a 10-15% advantage over BA.5.  In Germany, there has been a rising number of ICU patients and unusually, 30% of ICU patients are on a ventilator; excess deaths are also increasing. Some German hospitals have needed assistance because of the number of staff who are off sick.   In Southeast Asia, the XBB subvariant is causing a substantial infection wave, notably in Singapore with a high rate of reinfections due to waning immunity. However, only 15 people total are in the ICU (out of 6 million people) – this low number attributed to:  a highly vaccinated and boosted population, and also the history of a large BA.2 wave (more closely related to XBB than BA.1 which hit the USA).  This is expected to continue to lead to death rates in Singapore which are well below those of Germany and USA, despite the high case numbers.  (Sources: YLE, Airfinity).