Worldwide vaccine inequality threatens to unleash the next COVID-19 variant

On a warm South African day in mid-November 2021, Dr. Angelique Coetzee examined a 29-year-old man complaining of extreme fatigue and severe headaches. The symptoms seemed more consistent with heat stroke than the sore throat and fever she had noticed in her patients with COVID-19. At the end of the day, after seeing several similar cases test positive for COVID-19, Dr. Coetzee, chair of the South African Medical Association, became convinced that something was amiss. Within a week, investigators determined that her patients were infected with a new variant possessing multiple mutations (McKeever,  2021), B.1.1.529 BA.1 or “Omicron”.
Source: International Journal of Infectious Diseases - Category: Infectious Diseases Authors: Tags: Perspective Source Type: research