President Biden receives updates on the Omicron variant – White House Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have reported on the latest status of the new Omicron variant of COVID-19, the White House said on Saturday, as Britain, Germany and Italy reportedly detected cases.

Biden, who is spending Thanksgiving with his family in Nantucket, Massachusetts, told reporters on Friday, “We don’t know if he cares much about the variant. It seems to have spread quickly.”

This week Omicron was detected for the first time in South Africa to impose travel restrictions on countries around the world, including the United States, the southern African nation and at least seven other regions.

So far no case of Omicron has been identified in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday. The agency hopes to identify the variant quickly if it originates in the US

But Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease specialist, told NBC’s “Weekend TODAY” on Saturday, “I wouldn’t be surprised if I did.”

“When you have a virus that is showing this level of transmission and you have cases related to trips that have been detected in Israel and Belgium and elsewhere, when you have a virus like that, it will almost always go. Basically to go everywhere,” Fauci said.

The vice president told reporters that the administration would take “one step at a time” when asked about the additional travel restrictions. “We’ve done what we deem necessary for now,” Harris said.

The White House said senior health officials and its COVID response team are monitoring the latest updates to Omicron and have been in contact with health officials around the world.

(Reporting by Nandita Boser; written by Lucia Mutani; edited by Leslie Adler)