The world should “calm down” on the possibility of new variants of COVID-19 circulating in China, leading Chinese scientist George Gao said.
A paper by Gao and colleagues published Wednesday in the Lancet medical journal showed that no new variants had emerged in the first few weeks of China’s recent outbreak, after the end of its zero-COVID policy saw a huge surge in cases.
“The world should completely calm down from the fear that there are new variants or special variants out there [in China]Gao, a professor at the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and former head of the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), told Reuters.
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The variants causing infections in China were the same Omicron subvariants — BA.5.2 and BF.7 — seen in other parts of the world, he said by email.
The study analyzed 413 new cases of COVID in Beijing from November 14 to December 20, 2022 and found that all were likely caused by existing strains. It found that 90% of the predominantly locally acquired infections were due to the above two subvariants.
The findings are representative of the entire country, the authors said, citing characteristics of Beijing’s population and the circulation of highly transmissible COVID strains.
A prominent Chinese scientist has suggested that the rest of the world should “calm down” on the new variants of COVID-19 detected in his country. (REUTERS/Tingshu Wang)
China ended more than three years of a strict zero-COVID policy that involved citywide lockdowns, mass testing and an extensive quarantine in December, followed by a surge in infections among its 1.4 billion inhabitants.
A top government scientist said on Jan. 21 that 80 percent of people had already been infected, and China’s CDC has said repeatedly over the past month that ongoing monitoring has shown no new strains of COVID-19 have been found.
Many countries have put in place COVID testing requirements for Chinese travelers in the wake of its major outbreak, citing concerns that new variants may emerge and a lack of data, although China has said the measures are not warranted.
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Gao said China is continuing widespread viral genomic sequencing and would identify any new variants if they emerge.
He said cases are currently declining, but “a new wave is possible in the future.”
The China-funded Lancet study was conducted by researchers from the Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the CDC, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences University.
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The authors said there were some limitations to the study, including China’s decision to end mandatory large-scale testing.
