The Omicron variant of COVID-19 could have a double-edged effect on people, at least in the near future.
anthony fauci and the head of the fda now predict the omicron variant of kovitt will infect most people sabrina wilson explores whether that could bring us closer to what’s called herd immunity contagious may be an understatement in terms of the omicron variant dr benjamin springgate is lsu health new orleans chief of community and population medicine what we’re seeing is a variant that’s potentially two to three times more transmissible than the prior variant delta and as a result many many people are becoming ill here in new orleans as well as across the state across the country and across the world so two top federal health officials predict most people are going to get covered omicron will ultimately find just about everybody is that plausible i think we can see that it’s very likely that many many people are going to get this and if it’s the majority of the population we don’t know yet but it certainly doesn’t look great from the modeling perspective at the moment some average citizens say i think that it’s um it’s inevitable that we all get it is that concerning to you it is very concerning to me no it doesn’t it doesn’t concern me would hurt immunity happen if most people get infected part of the challenge is that between now and any possible herd immunity that we might hope for in the future we have the immediate challenge of hospitals filling up and when hospitals fill up that means that when someone has a heart attack or a stroke or a car accident there may not be that icu bed that they need there may not be that emergency department bed that they need but with so much of the world unvaccinated reaching hurt immunity may be easier said than done when there is such disparity in the vaccination availability between industrialized countries and non-industrialized countries we’re going to see persistent infections even if we are vaccinated five times over we’ll see persistent infections elsewhere and that may mean that new variants pop up herd immunity becomes a difficult proposition doctors say vaccinated and boosted people are less likely to be hospitalized and suffer severe outcomes so it’s time to make sure that everyone who’s eligible gets vaccinated if you’re eligible for a booster please get boosted and wear good masks such as a kn95 if you have one or a multi-layer mask or sometimes even two masks a surgical layer underneath a cloth mask i’m sabrina wilson fox 8 local first 62.7 percent of the u.s population is fully vaccinated according to the cdc and in louisiana it’s 54 percent
