A new omicron COVID-19 variant is spreading fast across the United States and beginning...
The new strain, XBB.1.5, was first detected on the east coast in late October and gained traction in December. Over the last four weeks, it has quickly edged out the previously dominant strains to make up 40 percent of cases nationally. It appears to be more transmissible than its predecessors, based on early lab results, with properties that help it evade vaccine immunity, said Dr. Luis Ostrosky, chief of infectious diseases with UTHealth Houston and Memorial Hermann Hospital.
“We are at a moment in the pandemic where a lot of people got sick over the summer and immunity is going down from natural infection,” Ostrosky said. “Vaccine rates are not great and boosting rates are abysmal in this country ... It does appear were converging into this immunity cliff.” Lately, the warnings have been falling on deaf ears, with inconsistent and at times confusing messaging from the federal coverage, the ongoing dominance of misinformation and an overall sense of apathy over a virus that continues to affect everyday life, said Dr. Peter Hotez, vaccine expert and infectious disease specialist at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s Hospital.
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