The World Health Organisation (WHO) has issued a warning against a new mutant 'XE' variant of Omicron, that may be more transmissible than any strain of Covid-19 seen before.

Locally our DOH has issued an alert to monitor this new variants as the first case of this new variant Omicorn XE has been detected in Thailand.

Observation and monitoring are still ongoing on whether the variant would be categorized as a sub-variant of Omicron or a new variant to be named by WHO should it display any significant change in characteristics.

This new variant apparently is a recombinant strain, meaning it is a mutant hybrid of the two previous versions of the Omicron variant, BA.1 and BA.2, which spread across the world when it first became a variant of concern.

According to reports, the new XE variant is 10 per cent more transmissible than the BA.2 subvariant, which is already the most contagious.
While XE only accounts for a small fraction of the cases, its extremely high transmissibility could mean that it becomes the most dominant strain in the near future.

Can 3 doses of Sinovac help prevent severe infection from this new variant?

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