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The Jerusalem Post

Leading Israeli epidemiologist not worried about new COVID-19 variant

 
 Scanning electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2, also known as novel coronavirus (photo credit: U.S. NIAID-RML/Handout via REUTERS)
Scanning electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2, also known as novel coronavirus
(photo credit: U.S. NIAID-RML/Handout via REUTERS)

The world's response to the latest pandemic and the social rifts created concern him more.

There is no reason to worry now about the new strain of COVID-19 called BA.2.86 that is being tracked by the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO), says Prof. Hagai Levine, a senior epidemiologist at the Hebrew University-Hadassah Braun School of Public Health and Community Medicine and head of the Israel Association of Public Health Physicians. 

However, he told The Jerusalem Post on Friday that “there is reason to worry about the lack of lessons learned in Israel and many other countries regarding the lack of investment and preparation for a pandemic and public health emergencies, politicization and damage to trust and solidarity. The lack of food security among the poorer sectors in Israel also increases mortality from infectious and other diseases, he added. 

The CDC is tracking the new, highly-mutated COVID variety found in a few places in Israel. Officials said that “as we learn more about BA.2.86, our advice on protecting yourself from COVID-19 remains the same.” The WHO added that, so far, only a few sequences of the variant named have been reported from a handful of countries and that it viewed it as as a “variant under monitoring” due to the large number of mutations it carries.

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Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital team members wearing safety gear as they work in the Coronavirus ward of Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospitall in Jerusalem on December 27, 2021, as Jerusalem hospital reopens COVID ward.  (credit: OLIVIER FITOUSSI/FLASH90)
Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital team members wearing safety gear as they work in the Coronavirus ward of Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospitall in Jerusalem on December 27, 2021, as Jerusalem hospital reopens COVID ward. (credit: OLIVIER FITOUSSI/FLASH90)

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