The omicron variant of the coronavirus is “raging” around the world, the White House’s top medical advisor Anthony Fauci said on Sunday.
Fauci said in a TV interview for NBC that the “real problem” for the US hospital system is that “we have so many people in this country who are eligible to be vaccinated who have not yet been vaccinated.”
Since it was first reported in November, omicron has been identified in dozens of countries. The spread of the variant has prompted many countries to reimpose travel restrictions and other measures.
Despite indications that it is not more severe than the delta variant of the virus, early data suggests that omicron could be more resistant to vaccines and have higher rates of transmission.
Peter Chin-Hong, Professor at the University of California in San Francisco, and Wolfgang Preiser, Professor at Stellenbosch University, explain what else we know about the omicron variant so far.
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