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What's News:

On 26 November 2021, WHO designated the variant B.1.1.529 a variant of concern, named Omicron, on the advice of WHO’s Technical Advisory Group on Virus Evolution (TAG-VE).  This decision was based on the evidence presented to the TAG-VE that Omicron has several mutations that may have an impact on how it behaves, for example, on how easily it spreads or the severity of illness it causes. Here is a summary of what is currently known.  

WHO, in collaboration with partners, expert networks, national authorities, institutions and researchers have been monitoring and assessing the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 since January 2020. During late 2020, the emergence of variants that posed an increased risk to global public health prompted the characterisation of specific Variants of Interest (VOIs) and Variants of Concern (VOCs), in order to prioritise global monitoring and research, and ultimately to inform the ongoing response to the COVID-19 pandemic.  

  • Nextstrain

    provides the latest data of genomic epidemiology of novel coronavirus-Ns3-focused subsampling and information on Genomic Surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 Variants. Actively updated and maintained by The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

  • WHO COVID-19 situation dashboard 
  • WHO COVID-19 situation reports

    Here you will find the latest situation updates and data regarding the COVID-19 outbreak from the World Health Organization.

  • CSSE coronavirus dashboard

    The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University developed an online dashboard to visualize and track the reported cases on a daily timescale. They also made the complete set of data downloadable as a Google Sheet. The map shows new cases, confirmed deaths and recoveries. Information on U.S. cases is taken from the U.S. CDC, and all other country case data is taken from the corresponding regional health departments. The dashboard is intended to provide the public with an understanding of the outbreak situation as it unfolds, using transparent data sources.

  • Your Local Epidemiologist / Dr. Katelyn Jetelina

"The purpose of this page is to "close the communication loop" by providing a direct line of science to you. My post are 100% data-driven and backed by the most recent scientific evidence. Some of these are my own analyses, some of these are based on other brilliant scientists peer reviewed studies, and some are science-driven resources"  (Dr. Katelyn jetelina, the creator of Your Local Epidemiologist 2021)

  • The Ovid search widget below will search for articles on Covid-19 in the Ovid Medline and Journals@Ovid databases:

This page contains links to epidemiological reports, published in Communicable Diseases Intelligence (CDI), Department of Health, Australia

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All COVID-19 related updates from Ahpra and the National Boards can be found here. 

provides ‘living’ guidelines, updated with new research in near real-time in order to give reliable, up-to-the minute advice to clinicians.

 

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This search is best run using Chrome or Firefox. Attempting to run this search in Internet Explorer may return an error message "Internet Explorer has modified this page to help prevent cross-site scripting". If this occurs and you do not have access to an alternative browser, please open PubMed using the link below and paste the search string, given below, directly into the search box.

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​​​​​The publishers listed below are making access to all resources related to Covid-19 freely available.

A collection of journal articles on the Coronavirus (Covid-19) of the Medical Journal of Australia.

This Collection of articles highlights all content published across the PLOS journals relating to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2019-21. PLOS is committed to disseminating research as quickly as possible, particularly in public health emergencies. All articles published in any PLOS journal are Open Access free of charge to all readers.

             includes international guidelines and country-based guidelines from Europe, UK, Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and US.

Research literature and scientific information

PubMed search (this search will retrieve records in PubMed on the Omicron variant)

On Twitter, #Omicron finds more recent information (select carefully), #B11529 finds older.

Report 49 - Growth, population distribution and immune escape of Omicron in England - WHO Collaborating Centre for Infectious Disease Modelling, MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis, Jameel Institute, Imperial College London - 16 December 2021

(News summary: Omicron largely evades immunity from past infection or two vaccine doses - Imperial College, London - 17 December 2021)

Press release: Discovery Health, South Africa’s largest private health insurance administrator, releases at-scale, real-world analysis of Omicron outbreak based on 211 000 COVID-19 test results in South Africa - 14 December 2021

 

PrePrints

COVID-19 severity prediction based on patient risk factors and number of vaccines received - MedRxiv-  3 January 2022

The hyper-transmissible SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant exhibits significant antigenic change, vaccine escape and a switch in cell entry mechanism - MedRxiv-  3 January 2022

Vaccines Elicit Highly Cross-Reactive Cellular Immunity to the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron Variant - MedRxiv-  3 January 2022

SIR model for assessing the impact of the advent of Omicron and mitigating measures on infection pressure and hospitalization needs - MedRxiv-  3 January 2022

Comparison of outcomes from COVID infection in pediatric and adult patients before and after the emergence of Omicron - MedRxiv-  2 January 2022

Early estimates of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant severity based on a matched cohort study, Ontario, Canada - MedRxiv-  2 January 2022

Effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines against Omicron or Delta infection - MedRxiv-  1 January 2022

Omicron infection enhances neutralizing immunity against the Delta variant - MedRxiv-  27 December 2021

High Rate of Asymptomatic Carriage Associated with Variant Strain Omicron - MedRxiv-  27 December 2021

Reduced infectivity but increased immune escape of the new SARS-CoV-2 variant of concern Omicron - bioRxiv -  27 December 2021

Saliva swabs are the preferred sample for Omicron detection - MedRxiv-  24 December 2021

Neutralization against Omicron SARS-CoV-2 from previous non-Omicron infection - bioRxiv -  22 December 2021

Neutralization and Stability of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron Variant - bioRxiv -  20 December 2021

Booster of mRNA-1273 Strengthens SARS-CoV-2 Omicron Neutralization - MedRxiv -  20 December 2021

Analysis: A meta-analysis of Early Results to predict Vaccine efficacy against Omicron - MedRxiv - 14 December 2021

Third BNT162b2 vaccination neutralization of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron infection - MedRxiv - 14 December 2021

Neutralization of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant by sera from BNT162b2 or Coronavac vaccine recipients - MedRxiv - 14 December 2021

Assessing impact of Omicron on SARS-CoV-2 dynamics and public health burden - MedRxiv - 14 December 2021

Improved neutralization of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant after Pfizer-BioNTech BNT162b2 COVID-19 vaccine boosting - bioRxiv -  13 December 2021

Effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines against the Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant of concern - KnowledgeHub - 10 December 2021

Omicron strain spreads with the doubling time of 3.2-3.6 days in South Africa province of Gauteng that achieved herd immunity to Delta variant - MedRxiv - 9 December 2021

What Omicron does, and How It Does It - arXiv - 8 December 2021

SARS-CoV-2 Omicron has extensive but incomplete escape of Pfizer BNT162b2 elicited neutralization and requires ACE2 for  infection - medRxiv - 9 December 2021  (Summary)  (RACGP news article - 8 December 2021 - First Omicron studies hint at enhanced role for boosters)

Insights on the mutational landscape of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant - bioRxiv - 8 December 2021

Increased risk of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection associated with emergence of the Omicron variant in South Africa - medRxiv - 2 December 2021

Omicron (B.1.1.529): Infectivity, vaccine breakthrough, and antibody resistance - arXiv - 1 December 2021

Recent articles

Emergence of new SARS-CoV-2 Variant of Concern Omicron (B.1.1.529) - highlights Africa's research capabilities, but exposes major knowledge gaps, inequities of vaccine distribution, inadequacies in global COVID-19 response and control efforts - International Journal of Infectious Diseases - January 2022

Relative Instantaneous Reproduction Number of Omicron SARS-CoV-2 variant with respect to the Delta variant in Denmark - Journal of Medical Virology - 30 December 2021

Omicron (B.1.1.529) Variant: Development, Dissemination, and Dominance - Journal of Medical Virology - 29 December 2021

Omicron (B.1.1.529 variant of SARS-CoV-2); an emerging threat: current global scenario - Journal of Medical Virology - 29 December 2021

Can a combination of vaccination and face mask wearing contain the COVID-19 pandemic? - Journal of Medical Virology - 28 December 2021

How severe are Omicron infections? - Nature - 17 December 2021

Characterization of the novel SARS-CoV-2 Omicron (B.1.1.529) Variant of Concern and its global perspective - Journal of Medical Virology - 14 December 2021

Covid-19: Do vaccines work against omicron—and other questions answered - BMJ - 10 December 2021

Omicron likely to weaken COVID vaccine protection (news) - Nature - 8 December 2021

Beyond Omicron: what’s next for COVID’s viral evolution- Nature - 7 December 2021

Detection of highly muted coronavirus variant Omicron (B.1.1.529) is triggering the alarm for South Asian countries: Associated risk factors and preventive actions - Journal of Medical Virology - 4 December 20201

Omicron SARS-CoV-2 variant: a new chapter in the COVID-19 pandemic - The Lancet - 3 December 2021

How bad is Omicron? What scientists know so far - Nature - 2 Dec 2021

The Newly Detected B.1.1.529 (Omicron) Variant of SARS-CoV-2 With Multiple Mutations Implications for transmission, diagnostics, therapeutics, and immune evasion - DHR Proceedings - 29 November 2021

WHO

WHO Global Consultation - What evidence do we have that omicron is evading immunity and what are the implications?  Webinar held 15 December 2021 14:30 – 17:30 CET.

Update 70 – Update on SARS-CoV-2 variant of concern Omicron - 14 December 2021

Enhancing Readiness for Omicron (B.1.1.529): Technical Brief and Priority Actions for Member States - 10 December 2021

WHO Joint Advisory Group on COVID 19 Therapeutics Prioritization - DRAFT Statement on the possible effects of the new SARS CoV-2 Omicron variant on treatment of hospitalized COVID-19 patients - 3 December 2021

Update on Omicron - WHO - 28 November 2021

Classification of Omicron (B.1.1.529): SARS-CoV-2 Variant of Concern - WHO

Information from other agencies

UK Health Security Agency SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern and variants under investigation in England, Technical Briefing 32 - 17 December 2021

Omicron variant - Australian Department of Health - 1 December 2021

CDC Statement on B.1.1.529 (Omicron variant) - 26 November 2021

Threat Assessment Brief: Implications of the emergence and spread of the SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1. 529 variant of concern (Omicron) for the EU/EEA - European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control - 26 November 2021

FAQ from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, South Africa - 26 November 2021

News articles

Most of the World’s Vaccines Likely Won’t Prevent Infection From Omicron - New York Times - December 9 2021

Opinion: Vaccination will continue to protect us, despite threat of Omicron / Peter Collignon - The Age - 15 December 2021

Omicron variant more resistant to vaccine but causes less severe covid, major South African study concludes - Washington Post - 15 December 2021

We know almost nothing about the Omicron variant: here's everything we do - The Atlantic - 28 November 2021

Why WHO skipped two Greek letters to name new Covid-19 variant Omicron - The Indian Express - 28 November 2021

Wikipedia - SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant

Scientists rapidly identified the Omicron variant. But firm answers about its impact could take weeks - STAT - 28 November 2021

Vaccine development

Moderna says an omicron variant vaccine could be ready in early 2022 - CNBC - 28 November 2021

Resources on PPE

Books reflected on COVID-19 crisis

Resources for Vaccination Providers

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