In what appears to be an extremely worrying sign, the UK Health Security Agency has identified an underline of the extremely contagious and contagious Omicron variant and taken it under investigation. In its preliminary comments, the health agency has said that the variant that shares the pedigree with the Omicron variant may also have growth benefits, the news agency Reuters reported. The strain that has currently been scientifically identified as BA.2 is currently being investigated but has not currently been identified as a variant of concern.

Dr Meera Chand, Head of Incident at UKHSA, was quoted as saying that the nature of the virus is such that it continues to develop and mutate in several forms. Dr Chand further said that the genomic monitoring carried out by the health authority is a move that aims to understand if the variant is worrying.

Overall, the UK has tracked 426 cases of the BA.2 underline and the UK Health Authority has said that cases of the BA.2 sequence have also been reported in Denmark, India, Sweden and Singapore. It was also stated that according to the early analysis, the BA.2 strain also has a growth advantage compared to the BA.1 strain, which is the original Omicron variant.

The number of BA.2 cases has also grown rapidly in Denmark, which has seen as many as 20 percent of the new cases reported during the last week of 2021 linked to the new strain. Anders Fomsgaard, a researcher at the Statens Serum Institut (SSI) was quoted as saying that the growth advantage of the new strain has puzzled him, but that does not really worry him at this stage. Asked about the emergence of the BA.2 strain as the dominant variant that replaces the original Omicron variant, Anders said that it is still a possibility and in that case the world could witness two peaks of the Coronavirus pandemic.

But the world may be relieved to know that the initial trend for hospitalization and mortality has indicated that there is not much difference in hospitalization between BA.2 and BA.1, according to the analysis conducted in Denmark.