JOIN USOmicron-led surge will be 'very fast', warns WHO expert
WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan warned that the surge led by the Omicron Covid-19 variant is "going to be very fast and many are going to be sick".
Swaminathan said that the outbreak of the new variant will see the burden shift from hospitals to the out-patients department, from ICUs to home-based care, adding that the biggest challenge India will face will be the sudden need for medical care.
"People are worried. You may not have symptoms but you would want to talk to a doctor, you'd want to see a healthcare worker, and you'd want advice. That's what we will have to prepare for," she said in an interview to NDTV.
She called for ramping up of teleconsultation services to tackle this sudden surge. "Maybe, this is the time to really scale up the telehealth and telemedicine services to make sure we have enough doctors and nurses in out-patients clinics; make sure we can treat people at home as much as possible or at primary care isolation centres where they get basic care if they don't need advance care."
Swaminathan cited data from South Africa and the UK about Omicron's quick spread, saying that number of cases with Omicron compared to Delta and other surges was four times more but the rate of hospitalisation is one-fourth.
"The actual number was 40,000 in the previous outbreaks during the peak and it was around 1,40,000 during Omicron. But at the same time, the risk of hospitalisation was one-fourth. So, it evens out - four times more transmissible, one-fourth the risk of hospitalisation. You end up with the same number of people in the hospitals," she said, warning people against getting complacent and treating the new variant like a common cold due to its mild symptoms.
The WHO expert cautioned that despite the low severity of the variant, doctors, hospitals, out-patients departments, health care workers, and the infrastructure in India may be overwhelmed.
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