New COVID Strain: WHO Declares Eris A ‘Variant Of Interest’

London: Though COVID-19 has long ceased to be a topic of daily conversation among global citizens, it’s still not a thing of the past.

There’s a new coronavirus variant EG.5, or Eris, which is currently circulating in the USA, UK and China.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has classified the new strain as a ‘variant of interest’.

Eris accounts for 17% of cases in the US. But despite its rapid spread, WHO has said that it does not appear to pose a greater threat to public health than other existing variants.

The new strain has been detected in some other countries like South Korea, Japan and Canada.

According to WHO’s risk evaluation panel, EG.5 variant is a descendant of Omicron strain. Though more transmissible, it is not more severe than other Omicron variants.

WHO, however, has called for a comprehensive evaluation of potential risks posed by this variant.

“We don’t detect a change in the severity of EG.5 compared to other sublineages of Omicron that have been in circulation since late 2021,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical lead on COVID-19.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressed concern over the lack of COVID-19 data from many countries.

The global health organisation issued a set of recommendations urging countries to continue reporting COVID data, particularly mortality and morbidity data, and to persist in offering vaccinations.

Since the outbreak of the global, coronavirus has claimed 6.9 million lives worldwide, with more than 768 million confirmed cases reported.

WHO, which declared pandemic status of the virus in March 2020, lifted the global emergency status in May this year.