Plot The spread of a new strain of coronavirus “omicron”
The risk of re-infection with coronavirus in the case of the omicron strain is five times higher compared to the delta variant, TASS reports, citing a study by epidemiologists at Imperial College London.
According to experts, before the appearance of omicron, a person’s natural immunity protected him from re-infection for six months in 85% of cases. However, after the discovery of a new strain, this indicator decreased to 19%.
Based on the indicators of infection and hospitalization, scientists claim that at the moment there is no evidence that “omicron” poses a lesser threat than the “delta” strain.
Experts claim that BioNTech, Pfizer and AstraZeneca’s two doses of the drug provide protection from infection only up to 20% against the omicron strain. However, it increases with the use of booster vaccination to 55-80%, the Imperial College added.
According to scientists, when infected with omicron, the level of antibodies after receiving a booster dose of vaccines used in the UK will be 4.5 times lower than in the case of the delta strain. At the same time, the probability of preventing a severe form of the disease with the omicron strain is 80.1%, whereas in the case of the delta, this indicator was 96.5%.
Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Tatyana Golikova said that the level of collective immunity to coronavirus in Russia was 58.2%.