#16,650
The CDC has released their latest Nowcast estimates of COVID in the United States, and after 9 weeks of eroding into Omicron BA.1's hold on the nation, BA.2 has broken out as the (just barely) dominant strain in the Northeastern part of the nation.
Nationwide, however, BA.2 has a little less than a 35% share (see map at top of blog), with large swaths of the interior of the nation, and the deep south, still below 30%.
The trend suggests BA.2 will overtake and likely supplant BA.1 in the next few weeks, and that may bring a new surge in cases in April and May. Despite earlier concerns, so far we haven't seen any credible evidence that BA.2 is any more severe than BA.1.
That said, BA.2 is far from benign. Particularly for the unvaxxed, or the elderly who have not received the booster shot.
The United States continues to report hundreds of deaths each day, and Hong Kong - which is dealing with a slightly different BA.2.2 subvariant and a low vaccine uptake among their elderly - continues to report one of the highest daily death rates (per capita) of the pandemic.
Countries in Europe (Switzerland, Germany, UK) and the Western Pacific (South Korea, New Zealand) which are reporting a lot of BA.2 are seeing rising or elevated daily cases (see chart above), but the percentage of severe cases and deaths remains relatively low.
The latest CDC Nowcast chart follows.
Given the limits of surveillance, testing, and genomic sequencing around the country, all of these numbers should be viewed as rough estimates. They do, however, paint a picture of BA.2 becoming dominant in the United States - and likely worldwide - in the weeks and months ahead.
At least, until something more `biologically fit' comes along.
