“Smoother in itself”: Australian state offers tracks on Omicron | Coronavirus pandemic News

Data from a New South Wales (NSW) hospital in Australia provide conclusive evidence that the Omicron variant is lighter than previous coronavirus strains.

Early admissions figures suggest that Omicron may be half as likely as Delta variants to get people into the hospital, according to an analysis by economist Andrew Lilley Diem Association.

Lilley, a doctoral student at Harvard University, estimated that COVID-19’s hospitalization rate had dropped from 6.9 percent to 3.6 percent in recent weeks as Omicron became the main strain in the state.

Lilley, who used the official statistics on hospital stays to create a “risk rate” for admissions, told Al Jazeera he was “fairly confident” that the strain was inherently lighter, although it would take longer to know the actual hospitalization rate for the mutation.

“The exact percentage is difficult to calculate before we receive more data on the growth of progress cases,” said Lilley, who posted his initial analysis on social media on Tuesday. “But it’s very likely to be so virulent.”

Lilley, whose peer review has not been reviewed, said the data suggest that the serious disease associated with Omicron is not just because people are more likely to re-infect people with COVID-19.

Even a Growing evidence from South Africa, Denmark and the UK shows that Omicron is suffering from milder diseases, scientists are divided on whether the variant is inherently milder or whether it is more often associated with progressive infections.

“The perfect lab”

The severity of the New South Wales variant is considered a fertile environment due to the low number of people previously infected, the steady number of Delta cases in recent weeks, the stable baseline and the low rate of vaccine strengthening.

About 80 percent of cases in the state, where 94 percent of adults over the age of 16 get two vaccines, are believed to be Omicron, according to health authorities.

“New South Wales is the perfect laboratory because we know that selectivity for re-infections is not a factor in the lower hospitalization rate of Omicron and that vaccination rates were so high that most Delta cases were advances,” Lilley said.

The state reported 5,715 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, the largest jurisdiction in Australia since the pandemic began, but only 347 patients in hospital and 45 in intensive care.

Catherine Bennett, a public health expert and epidemiologist at Deakin University in Melbourne, told Al Jazeera that the analysis was “gratifying” even though it was still “in its infancy”.

“Many of our initial cases were related to the events of the disseminators and therefore 20-30 year olds were over-represented; which, however, will lead to lower hospitalization rates, ”Bennett said.

“But definitely [it’s the] the same goes for Delta cases, and they will spread the virus to old contacts without even knowing it. So the longer that trend lasts, the calmer it becomes. ”

Alexandra Martiniu, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Sydney School of Medicine and Health, told Al Jazeera that the many factors affecting hospitalization rates made it difficult to draw conclusions about the severity of Omicron at this point.

“Until we have more data on fully embedded cases and the need for hospitalization, as well as the older and non-vaccinated adults we see with more Omicron cases, it will be difficult to make stable statements about the hospitalization rate of cases. Omicron NSW,” Martiniu said.