ADVERTISEMENT
DOH: Monitoring of highly transmissible prevalent Omicron subvariants continuous
By RICHA NORIEGA,GMA Integrated NewsThe Department of Health (DOH) on Friday said it was continuously monitoring, both at local and global levels, the prevalent Omicron subvariants with higher transmissibility.
In a forum, DOH-Epidemiology Bureau Director IV Dr. Alethea De Guzman said Omicron and its subvariants had become the global prevalent sequence.
“In this year alone various Omicron subvariants with higher transmissibility or more significant immune evasion capacity have actually emerged and we are continuously monitoring it both at the local and global levels,” said De Guzman.
De Guzman said the Health Department was monitoring two Omicron subvariants, BQ.1. and BA.2.75, based on the sequence submission.
“Based on sequence submission, meron tayong dalawa na subvariant na Omicron na binabantayan dahil ang kanilang prevalence, pagtinotal natin lahat yung kanilang contribution sa lahat na na-sequence natin na samples, they accounted for more than 5% globally. That’s a lot considering ang dami ng subvariants ng Omicron,” she explained.
The DOH official said BQ.1.1 accounts for almost 14%, while the BA.2.75 accounts for around 17% of prevalence.
“Ibig sabihin continuously nag occur pa rin siya hindi siya masyadong napapalitan ng bagong subvariants at ito pa rin yung mas madalas nating nakikita na mga subvariants,” she said.
Last October 2022, US health regulators estimated that BQ.1 and the closely related BQ.1.1 accounted for 16.6% of coronavirus variants in the country, while Europe expected them to become the dominant variants within that month.
Meanwhile, Dr. Rontgene Solante earlier said that BA.2.75 may be more transmissible and may evade the current vaccines available against the coronavirus disease.
Travelers from China
De Guzman said four of the eight Filipinos who arrived in the Philippines from China over the holidays had tested positive for COVID-19 and had been infected with Omicron subvariants BF.7 and BA.5.2.
“Nagawa na yung sequencing nito natin even though eight nag-postive sa PCR, four lamang yung na assigned na lineages. Bakit hindi lahat may assigned na lineages? Minsan yung papa transport nade-deplete yung quality ng specimen kaya hindi natin siya ma-sequence. So yung nakita natin tatlo doon lumabas na BF.7 at isa ay BA.5.2,” she said.
“Ito yung mga hindi bagong variants dati na natin nade-detect. Kung unusual or unique? No. We have already previously detected these variants that we have found in 8 positive individuals.”
Citing reports from the Bureau of Quarantine (BOQ), the DOH said the travelers arrived in the Philippines from December 27, 2022, to January 2, 2023.
ADVERTISEMENT
DOH officer-in-charge Maria Rosario Vergeire earlier said all close contacts were being monitored.
“Lahat close contacts nito are all under monitoring they are going to be monitored every day until the time tapos na po ang protocols for monitoring,” Vergeire said.
“Yung isang may sintomas ay sinubject sa testing at currently isolated until we can get the results of the test,” she added.
The Health Department also said it was still unnecessary to impose more restrictions on travelers coming from China.
End of COVID-19 emergency
Meanwhile, De Guzman echoed the World Health Organization's (WHO's) hope that COVID-19 would no longer be a public health emergency in 2023.
“I think much like the WHO, it’s really a monitoring, it’s a waiting game for us. Bakit ko sinasabi ‘yun? We don’t want to be blindsided by the emergence of new variants. I think for me that is the only unknown that remains here kasi patuloy siyang nagbabago. Every month may bago nanamang variant,” she said.
“If there will be some stability in the emergence of this variant I think we will be more comfortable to say that yes, the emergency phase will end. While there is more uptick in cases, we know that there will be no significant upticks in our admissions and our fatalities,” she said.
De Guzman said that while they were hopeful that what the WHO had said would come true, it didn't fully depend on us. It also depended on how the virus would change.
De Guzman, meanwhile, said that the health system capacity remained at “low risk” despite a slight increase in COVID-19 cases and non-COVID-19 admissions.
The DOH on Thursday logged 307 new COVID-19 infections, bringing the total number of cases since the pandemic broke out in March 2020 to 4,069,147.
This was the fifth straight day with fewer than 500 COVID-19 cases reported. — DVM, GMA Integrated News