When the local Aomi Kejung attacked, how to do a good job in prevention and control? Guangdong disease control experts authoritative answer questions

Text/Yangcheng Evening News all-media reporter Yu Yanhong correspondent Guangdong Disease Control

From January 13 to 16, Zhongshan, Zhuhai, Shenzhen and Meizhou in Guangdong Province successively reported positive cases of local Omilon. According to the official circular of the joint prevention and control mechanism of the State Council, the mainland is facing the dual challenge of the import of delta and Omicron strains.

Will Omicron be more powerful than Delta? During the Spring Festival, how should the public do a good job in prevention and control? On January 17, Lin Peng, deputy director of the Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention and chief scientist in the field of prevention and control of infectious diseases, called on the public to be vigilant and answer questions of concern.

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Q: Compared to Delta, will the Aomikron mutant strain have a stronger spreading power?

Lin Peng: The Aomi Kerong virus has a higher load and increased transmission.

The Omicron variant was first detected in South Africa on 9 November 2021, and the World Health Organization classified it as a variant being monitored on 24 November and upgraded it to a strain of concern on 26 November. On 11 January 2022, the World Health Organization announced that Omiqueron had replaced Delta as the dominant strain worldwide. According to incomplete statistics, the Aumechjong mutation has spread to at least 173 countries.

The team at the University of HKU School of Medicine found that 24 hours after infection, the viral load in human bronchial tissue was nearly 70 times higher than that of Delta. Therefore, Omi Keron also has the characteristics of faster replication speed and stronger replication ability.

On December 23, the UK Health Security Agency released cohort analysis data showing that the home recurrence rate of those infected with the Omikejong strain was 13.6% and the out-of-home recurrence rate was 7.6%,while the household renewal rate of those infected with the Delta strain was 10.1% and the out-of-home replication rate was 2.8%; the risk of infection of close contacts in both the home environment and the outside of the home environment was significantly higher than that of the Delta strain infected.

Q: What are the main symptoms of infection with the Aomi Kerong variant? Is there a high risk of severe illness?

Lin Peng: After infection, mild diseases are the mainstay.

Due to the lag in the duration of onset to severe illness/death, the clinical severity of Omi kerong still needs more data to be explored. Up to now, the vast majority of infected people have only shown mild symptoms or asymptomatic, with fewer severe cases and very few deaths, and the main symptoms include cough, fatigue, nasal congestion, runny nose, drowsiness, headache, sore throat, fever and other flu-like symptoms.

Researchers in South Africa, the United Kingdom and other countries found that those infected with Omikejong were at lower risk of severe illness than those who were not infected with Omikeron and those who were infected with early Delta in the same period.

For example, on December 28, 2021, South African researchers published a study showing that the proportion of people infected with the Semikron strain was 4.5% vs 21.3%, the ICU occupancy rate was 1% VS 4.3%, and the length of hospital stay was 4.0 days vs 8.8 days compared with those infected with the Non-Semiquerong strain before the outbreak, and the proportion of hospitalized patients who needed oxygen was 45% VS 99.5%; only one-third of those infected with the Omikejong strain had pneumonia symptoms, of which 72% were mild and moderate.

It is worth mentioning that although studies have shown that the virulence of the Aumechjong variant is weakened, the heads of institutions such as the WHO and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have said that the highly transmitted Opichron variant can cause a surge in the number of cases and may still crush the health system.

Q: I heard that there is immune escape in Aumequeron, can the COVID-19 vaccine we currently use prevent Aumicron?

Lin Peng: Yes. The study found that Omiljung had a significant escape from previous infections and vaccination-induced humoral immunity, but full vaccination still greatly protected people from severe illness.

A US study showed that cellular immunity was not greatly affected by Omilon, and that enhanced vaccination, especially heterologous booster vaccination (e.g., inactivated virus vaccine + recombinant protein subunit vaccine/mRNA vaccine), could significantly improve the body's neutralizing antibody titer.

Studies have shown that the research and development of pan-coronavirus vaccines may be the key research and development direction of new coronavirus vaccines in the future.

Q: During the Spring Festival, how should citizens take precautions?

Lin Peng: After arriving in Guangdong, cross-provincial mobile personnel completed a nucleic acid test for the new crown virus in a timely manner and strengthened self-health monitoring.

If there are acute symptoms such as fever, cough, sore throat, decreased sense of smell (taste), or the health code becomes "yellow code", do not buy your own medicine, you should immediately undergo a nucleic acid test and seek medical treatment, and do not travel until the risk of infection is excluded.

People aged 18 years and over who have reached 6 months after completing the full vaccination, receive the booster injection as soon as possible for optimal protection. (For more news, please pay attention to Yangcheng Pie pai.ycwb.com)

Source | Yangcheng Evening News Yangcheng Pie

Editor-in-charge | Xie Zhe