Ómicron’s BA.2 variant already dominates in Portugal. Even higher mortality
A little over a month later, the BA.2 lineage of the Ómicron variant, detected for the first time in Denmark, in January, also became dominant in Portugal. According to the latest report on the Red Lines, prepared by the National Institute of Health Dr. Ricardo Jorge (INSA) and the Directorate-General for Health, released on Friday night, the BA.2 lineage on March 3 had a frequency of around 67.5%, leaving behind the first lineage to be detected in South Africa, in early December, BA.1, which had an activity of 32 .5%, had the degree of contamination of the world in its degree of contamination but its degree of elevation.
But with the predominance of the BA.2 activity, the BA.2 activity specialist explained to the DN, the INSA specialist, João Paulo Gomes, a few weeks ago, in a situation there is nothing to be sure about, that is to say that “BA. 2 is still more “contagious than the BA.1 lineage”. The luck, regarding this variant, is that it is not as severe as Delta, attacking more like the upper respiratory tract, nose and mouth, and not as much as other organs. , like the lungs.
This week, data analyst Carlos Antunes, from the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon, who is part of the team that since the beginning of the pandemic, defended to DN that the country had reached a comfortable situation in relation to the number of cases, and should stabilize. in the next few days, between 5,000 and 10,000 cases.
Yesterday, Portugal registered 13,696 new infections of covid-19, 20 internal deaths, 1189 internal deaths, 78 less than the previous day, of which 85 were in intensive care, one more than the previous day, thus maintaining the trend of decline that has been noticed in recent days. The Red Lines report also confirms that “the number of people with covid-19 admitted to the ICU showed an increasing trend, corresponding to 35% (in the previous week it was 42%) of the defined critical value of 255 occupied beds”.
However, it leaves a warning in relation to mortality, which maintains a high impact, despite showing an increasing trend. Portugal has an average of 41.7 deaths per million inhabitants in 14 days, which represents “a classification of the impact of the pandemic as high”.
In December at the lowest risk of people, the same full report referred to seven times that unvaccinated citizens among a total of infected people and that “citizens with a vaccinated schedule” a complete vaccination schedule had a risk of death from two to six times lower than the unvaccinated, among the total infected in January”.
Regarding the dose of restriction people, the comparison data to whom else is defined – the prevention scheme with full 80 years. 65 years or older, “the booster vaccine conferred a higher protection, greater than or equal to 94%, in relation to more serious situations, such as hospitalization and death”.
In the first week of March, that of the different indicators also reveals that the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic activity is still of “very high intensity”, although with a “decreasing trend in all regions”, by the health authorities recommending the maintenance of the surveillance of the epidemiological protection of individual measures and maintenance of resistance protection.
Highest incidence in the age group of 65 years and over
According to the Red Lines report, published on Friday, the number of new cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection per 100,000 inhabitants, accumulated in the last 14 days, was 1,420 cases, with a downward trend at the last 14 days. nationally and in all regions of the continent.
In the age group aged 65 and over, the number of new cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection per 100 million inhabitants, accumulated in the last 14 days, is still 878 cases, although with a decreasing trend at national level. . OR