Omicron: US to see 140mn new COVID infections between January-March

US: With Omicron becoming the dominant variant of COVID in the US, accounting for over 73 per cent cases, new modeling data shows that the highly transmissible new strain will cause 140 million new infections from January to March, infecting 60 per cent of all Americans, the majority of which will be asymptomatic cases.

According to researchers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, while infection will surge, it will have fewer hospitalisations and deaths compared to the Delta variant, USA Today reported.

The findings showed that the COVID cases may peak in late-January at about 2.8 million new daily infections.

“We are expecting an enormous surge in infections … so, an enormous spread of omicron,” IHME director Dr Chris Murray was quoted as saying.

“Total infections in the US we forecast are going from about 40 per cent of the US having been infected so far, to having in the next 2 to 3 months, 60 per cent of the US getting infected with Omicron,” he added.

While meta-analyses have suggested previous variants cause about 40 per cent of cases to be asymptomatic, Murray said more than 90 per cent of people infected with omicron may never show symptoms.

As a result, only about 400,000 cases may be reported, as most Americans infected with the virus won’t feel sick and may never get tested, the report said. – IANS