Covid Italy, record infections. Omicron will infect half of Europe

New record of covid infections in Italy while Omicron runs. According to the WHO “over 50% of the population of the European Region will be infected” by the new variant “in the next 6-8 weeks”. Meanwhile Pfizer announces a specific vaccine. Read also Covid In Italy, the latest bulletin There are 220,532 new infections from Coronavirus registered in Italy in 24 hours, 294 dead. This is the highest number of the fourth wave. Since yesterday, 1,375,514 swabs have been processed with a positivity rate of 16%. There were 185 admissions to intensive care in 24 hours, 1,677 in total. There are 727 hospitalized with symptoms, 17,067 in total. There are 7,554,344 infected with Covid-19 since the beginning of the emergency, while the victims rise to 139,265. The healed are 5,410,482, 56,560 in the last 24 hours. To date in Italy there are 2,004,597 Coronavirus positives, 60,618 more than yesterday. WHO “Over 50% of the population of the European Region will be infected” by the Omicron variant “in the next 6-8 weeks”. Thus the WHO regional director for Europe, recalling that the European region “recorded over 7 million new cases of Covid reported in the first week of 2022, more than doubled in a two-week period”. “As of January 10, 26 countries reported that over 1% of their population has fallen ill every week,” he added. On the hospitalization front, continues Kluge, “let’s take the example of Denmark, where Omicron cases have exploded. in recent weeks: the hospitalization rate for Covid-19 in unvaccinated patients was 6 times higher than vaccinated in the week of Christmas. And data from the UK obstetric surveillance system show that 96% of pregnant women admitted to hospital with Covid-19 symptoms between May and October 2021 was not vaccinated, one in 3 needed respiratory support “. These are the cases illustrated by Kluge at the press conference to “reaffirm that the vaccines currently approved continue to provide good protection against serious illness and death, even for Omicron”. Ema “We have not yet seen the data on the fourth dose” of the anti-Covid vaccine. “We are quite concerned about a strategy that involves repeated vaccinations in a short period of time. We cannot continue giving booster doses every three or four months.” Marco Cavaleri, head of Ema vaccines, points out. The Omicron variant “is highly contagious, which causes a high number of infected individuals. So it is very important to be aware of the potential burden” that it could create to the detriment of health systems, “and do not consider it a mild disease”, Cavaleri then points out, recalling that the “preliminary results of recently published studies show that the efficacy of vaccines against asymptomatic disease is significantly reduced for Omicron, and that it tends to fade over time. serious illness and hospitalization related to the Omicron variant, the emerging evidence suggests that vaccines continue to provide high protection “, Cavaleri points out. The expert Ema therefore stresses that” no one knows when we will reach the end of the tunnel, but we will get there We are seeing that we move “towards a scenario where Covid” becomes more endemic, but we cannot say that we have already reached that st atus “. The virus, he continues, “still behaves like a pandemic virus and the emergence of Omicron shows this clearly. We must not forget that we are still in a pandemic.” “Nonetheless, with increased immunity in the population and with Omicron there will be a lot of natural immunity beyond that given by vaccination, we will quickly move to a scenario closer to coronavirus endemicity,” Cavaleri says. anti-Covid adapted to the Omicron variant would be a “natural candidate” for approval in the EU, other options “such as a polyvalent vaccine, cannot be excluded as potential alternatives”. “Further data is needed – Cavaleri underlines – to decide whether an adapted vaccine, with a different composition, is justified. Many elements must be kept in mind, knowing that by the time any vaccine adapted to Omicron is developed, it is possible that the framework epidemiological in the EU has undergone a significant evolution, as regards the variants in circulation and the exposure to Omicron “. Pfizer Pfizer vaccine specific for the Omicron variant will be ready by March. This was announced by Albert Bourla, CEO of the US pharmaceutical giant, in an interview with Cnbc. The company has already started producing doses, Bourla said, adding that the vaccine will also affect other variants in circulation. “The hope is to be able to get a product that will have better protection particularly against infection, because protection against hospitalization and severe illness is reasonable at this time, with the vaccines currently available, as long as you have the third dose. “said Bourla.