ReutersGilead Sciences Inc.’s antiviral drug remdesivir showed antiviral activity against Omicron, Delta and other variants of the coronavirus in laboratory studies, the company said on February 11.
Novavax Inc. said on February 10 the company’s two-dose vaccine was 80% effective against COVID-19 in a late-stage trial testing the shot in teens aged 12 to 17 years.
The coronavirus pandemic reached a grim new milestone in the United States on Feb. 4 with the nation’s cumulative death toll from COVID-19 surpassing 900,000, even as the daily number of lives lost began to level off, according to data collected by Reuters.
Novavax Inc. filed for emergency use authorization of the company’s COVID-19 vaccine for U.S. adults, a long-awaited step following months of struggles with development and manufacturing problems.
The prevailing theory about the Omicron variant is that it is going to rip through the population quickly and possibly burn out, marking the downside of the COVID-19 pandemic. But researchers are expressing concern about a subvariant of Omicron dubbed BA.2 that appears to be tearing through Denmark, just as the first Omicron wave subsided.
The BA.2 subtype of the Omicron coronavirus variant appears to have a substantial growth advantage over the currently predominant BA.1 type, Britain’s UK Health Security Agency said on Jan. 28.
The Omicron variant appears to result in less severe COVID-19 than seen during previous periods of high coronavirus transmission including the Delta wave, with shorter hospital stays, less need for intensive care and fewer deaths, according to a new U.S. study.
The Omicron variant can survive longer than earlier versions of the coronavirus on plastic surfaces and human skin, Japanese researchers found in laboratory tests. Additionally, new research shows users of rapid antigen tests to detect COVID-19 should swab their nostrils as directed by the manufacturer and not swab the throat or cheek instead.
In very young children, the Omicron variant of the coronavirus causes less severe disease than the Delta variant, according to a new study. In other research, new findings add to evidence that people with a certain version of a gene are less likely to develop severe COVID-19.
The highly infectious Omicron coronavirus variant causes less severe disease than the Delta strain but it remains a “dangerous virus,” particularly for those who are unvaccinated, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on January 12.
