By Nathaniel Nartey.
General-Secretary of the Ghana Medical Association, Dr. Titus Beyuo says there is the likelihood of new strains of the Covid-19 Virus emerging which will be more deadly and highly transmissible than the Omicron strain. He said the virus is able to mutate into different strains if herd immunity is not achieved.
To this end, Dr. Beyuo has called for the equitable distribution of Covid-19 vaccines to enable African Countries to vaccinate a sizable proportion of the population.
He said although data on the Omicron variant is still scanty, it is likely to evade the immune system.
”We are not sure yet now what this virus (Omicron) will do to the immune system..but with the mutations that have been seen, it may suggest that it may be able to evade the immune system but like I keep saying its early days yet and we need more information on it…..there is that likely possibility that we keep discovering new variants until we minimise the percentage of susceptible hosts in the communities. This means until the entire world is vaccinated, we will keep getting new variants”.
Dr. Beyuo said it is wrong to immediately conclude that being vaccinated against covid-19 means you are immune to the latest strain but was quick to add that getting the jab gives you a level of protection.
”Whether vaccinated persons are immune to this new variant (Omicron) I think the science is still evolving, we cannot make a conclusive statement yet but definitely it is possible that there will be some benefits of the vaccines”, according to Dr. Titus Beyuo.
