South Africa has confirmed that a case of the new COVID-19 subvariant, EG.5, also known as Eris, has been detected in the country.
ARCHIVE: Bush Radio's Renato van Schalkwyk gets innoculated for COVID-19Health ministry spokesperson, Foster Mohale, said the new
variant was found within a sample taken from a patient in Gauteng, and was
detected two months ago.
"Yes, we can confirm just like parts of the world
which have recorded a sub-variant of Omicron which in South Africa we have
recorded only one case, even though it was two months ago we recorded the case.
"We want to urge the public not to panic but to but
remain vigilant at all times, like practicing non-pharmaceutical intervention
like maintain hygiene, using sanitisers, water and soap in order to prevent
this possible transmission of this variant although this is transmissible but
it is not severe like the previous variant."
Currently the number of tests and people testing positive for SARS-CoV-2 in South Africa is very low and as a result very few samples have been sequenced. In June 2023, one of the sequenced samples was EG.5.2, a sub-lineage of EG.5. lineage (https://t.co/PPu5BBWRkg).
— NICD (@nicd_sa) August 16, 2023
Eris is regarded as being highly transmissible but as deadly,
meaning it is likely to spread quickly but won’t be more severe.
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