China’s battle against the COVID-19 pandemic takes a new turn as researchers predict recurring infection cycles every six months in the absence of COVID-19 restrictions and the dominance of highly infectious variants. Although not unexpected, these rolling waves of infections carry the inherent risk of new and potentially more severe variants emerging, posing further challenges to containment efforts.
Ali Mokdad, an epidemiologist at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, acknowledged the inevitability of repeated infections with the virus in a report published in the journal Nature. However, the concern lies in the possibility of a new variant emerging that can rival and surpass the current ones in terms of severity.
The current surge in China is primarily attributed to a highly infectious subvariant of Omicron known as XBB.1.5, first identified in India last August. Respiratory physician Nanshan Zhong warned that by the end of this month, as many as 65 million people could be infected per week.
China has achieved a commendable vaccination rate, with over 90% of the population vaccinated. However, immunity is waning, and XBB has the ability to bypass the protection provided by vaccines and prior infections. While XBB has not yet caused a significant rise in hospitalizations and deaths, the sheer number of infections places strain on China’s healthcare system.
The XBB variant has also caused minor waves in other parts of the world, such as Singapore and the United States. This pattern is observed globally, but its impact is more pronounced in China due to its large population.
Yunlong Cao, an immunologist at Peking University, and his team have discovered that antibodies generated against previous Omicron variants BA.5 and BF.7, which were dominant during the December wave in China, provide approximately four months of protection against strains like XBB1.
The highly transmissible nature of XBB has been observed in previous…
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