The World Health Organisation (WHO) has classified EG.5 as the latest Covid-19 variant of interest. File Picture: Doctor Ngcobo/African News Agency (ANA)
The World Health Organization (WHO), which declared a new Covid-19 variant dubbed “Eris”, said the new strain has not raised any alarms as yet, but it is likely to cause a spike in infections.
The variant has been designated the letter E and goes by the name EG.5 or Eris.
On August 11, the WHO classified EG.5 as a variant of interest, but the organisation said the public health risk posed by EG.5 was low at a global level.
EG.5 or Eris has been described as other variants like XBB1.16, whose chances of becoming severe were very low.
"The virus is evolving and circulating in every country, and EG.5 is one of the latest variants of interest that we are classifying. This is what we have to prepare for," said Dr Maria van Kerkhove.
Van Kerkhove is an infectious disease epidemiologist who serves as the technical lead for the Covid-19 response at the Who.
"So far, in terms of the sequencing, we need countries to continue that and sharing databases so that our technical advisory group can monitor, assess and conduct these risk evaluations and publish them regularly," she said.
However, the South African Medical Association’s (SAMA) Mvuyisi Mzukwa said the new variant is likely to cause severe symptoms for immuno-compromised people, and those who are older than 65 years.
The main symptoms of this rising sub-variant are similar to previous Omicron symptoms. One such symptom is a sore throat.
Covid-19 can also trigger inflammation of the membranes lining the nose and sinuses, which is an immune response, and can lead to a runny nose, sneezing.
Coughing with or without phlegm, headache, hoarse voice, muscle aches and an altered sense of smell were also listed as some of the symptoms.
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