Amid the Omicron fears around the world, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has now released a report stating that while COVID-19 cases in South Africa driven by the super mutant Omicron variant have surged 255 percent in the last week, the infections are showing milder symptoms than seen in the last three waves.
WHO said that South Africa accounted for 46 percent of the globally reported Omicron cases. The variant has spread to 60 countries so far.
South Africa's biggest private healthcare provider Netcare revealed that the recent rise in infections, which includes the Omicron and Delta variants, has been accompanied by a much smaller increase in admissions to intensive care beds, Dailymaverick reported.
"Having personally seen many of our patients across our Gauteng hospitals, their symptoms are far milder than anything we experienced during the first three waves," Netcare's Richard Friedland was quoted as saying to the South African daily.
"Approximately 90 percent of COVID-19 patients currently in our hospitals require no form of oxygen therapy and are considered incidental cases. If this trend continues, it would appear that, with a few exceptions of those requiring tertiary care, the fourth wave can be adequately treated at a primary care level," he added.
According to Friedland, "all patients had presented with mild to moderate flu-like symptoms, including a blocked or runny nose, headache, and a scratchy or sore throat".
"The main observation that we have made over the last two weeks is that the majority of patients in the COVID wards have not been oxygen dependent. Sars-CoV-2 has been an incidental finding in patients that were admitted to the hospital for another medical, surgical, or obstetric reason," Dr Fareed Abdullah, of the South African Medical Research Council, said.
However, experts have said it is still too early in the Omicron outbreak to determine the longer-term course of the illness. Moreover, the country has reported an increase in infections in the younger population.
