I hope that the French Keep this to themselves
A French scientist has warned that a new variant of the Covid Omicron virus, dubbed “BA.2,” could cause a new wave of the epidemic in France, just days after authorities predicted the peak of infections was passing.
Professor Antoine Flahault, epidemiologist at the Institut Pasteur and a member of government advisory body le Conseil scientifique, has said that “BA.2” could cause a “rebound” spread across the country.
Professor Flahault, who is also director at The Institute of Global Health in Geneva, said that the new variant could be the reason that cases in France are not falling as quickly as expected.
He
told CNews this morning (January 20): “In the UK, the number of new Covid-19 cases is halving every seven days. We expected France to follow the UK's lead, with a two-week delay: this is not the case.”
In the UK, 108,069 new Covid cases were recorded yesterday (January 19), and the number of infections being reported each week has come down by at least 37.5%, meaning that the curve of the Omicron-related wave is now moving sharply downwards.
In France, there were
436,167 new cases yesterday, and the infection rate is still rising.
“This new variant could be the source of the very recent increase in contaminations that we are currently seeing,” Professor Flauhault said.
He added that the BA.2 (as opposed to BA.1, the current dominant Omicron variant), has already been detected in India, Singapore, and Belgium.
www.connexionfrance.com
