With our immunity, the “kraken” behaves “impudently”

The new strain of coronavirus XBB.1.5, dubbed “kraken” in non-medical circles, has become the most contagious (i.e. contagious) of all previously identified strains.

This was announced during a press conference at the DOS by an epidemiologist, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Medical Sciences Gennady Onishchenko. For the first time, according to him, this strain was identified in the United States in October 2022, and at the beginning of the second decade of January 2023, it was already detected in the Russian Federation in the Penza region (a message about this was posted in the media by Rospotrebnadzor).

Doctors call the main danger of the “kraken” its ability to evade the immune response and re-infect those who have recently been ill with other strains. But in terms of virulence (i.e., the severity of the disease it causes), it, as Gennady Onishchenko noted, is the same as “omicron”:

“Indeed, like any new emerging strain, it is becoming more and more impudent with our immunity. It does indeed have great abilities to bypass the immunity we already have, both vaccine-induced immunity and disease-induced immunity. We do not note any superpowers in him, except for his high contagiousness.

In connection with the spread of a new, more contagious strain around the world, Gennady Onishchenko recalled the ongoing scandal between the Chinese government and the World Health Organization (WHO), which publicly questions the data provided by the Chinese authorities:

“This is all the more strange, given that during all three years of the pandemic, the PRC has demonstrated the most responsible attitude both on the part of the government and the people towards the incidence of coronavirus. This gave a positive result not only for China itself, but for the entire planet: because if China had such an attitude, as, for example, in Western Europe or in the USA, we would see completely different figures in front of us today. China demonstrated the most severe measures, “zero tolerance”, as they called it. They literally saved the planet. After the 20th Congress of the CCP was held, they relaxed the measures, made it possible to switch to standards close to those of the WHO, indeed, an increase in the incidence began to be noted. So, according to WHO, as of January 16, 2023, 10 million 927 thousand cases were registered in China from January 3 to January 16. Where they got this figure is not clear … China stopped collecting tests daily and transferred the coronavirus to the “B” disease group, which means that each region (and they have 31 of them and “plus” three more island regions) began to report not daily, but monthly. They also canceled the most severe measures on the border, and this is of interest to us, since there is not a single border on Earth that is as long as we have with China. And the abolition of measures at the border is the right of both our citizens to go there, and theirs here. Therefore, we are now monitoring the situation very closely.”

In addition to the emergence of a new strain of coronavirus, the epidemic situation in the Russian Federation is complicated by an increase in the incidence of influenza and SARS. Thus, according to Rospotrebnadzor, the incidence of influenza and SARS increased by 53% in just a week.

“As for the flu, after the first week of January, which coincided with the school holidays, when students were separated, the flu began to increase. Moreover, the growth is noticeable, significant, and it suggests that we need to think very seriously about the flu. So, in the second week growth was noted in Moscow. It dominates in Moscow, as in our entire country, the H1N1 strain (swine flu of the 2009 sample). In Moscow, 7 million 589 thousand 650 people were vaccinated, which is 60% of the total population; more than 1.5 million people have been vaccinated – this is 69.7%. In “risk groups” according to social indications (these are people employed in public catering, trade, and transport), the coverage level is 75%. (…) In Russia as a whole, there is also an increase in the incidence: in 21 capitals of the regions, the growth in the second week of January exceeded the threshold values ​​by 20%,” said Gennady Onishchenko.

Considering all this, the academician once again recalled that the H1N1 swine flu strain has high virulence (i.e., the disease is quite severe – with high fever and intoxication), and urged not to be a hero in case of symptoms and not to go to work with temperature, and immediately call the clinic.

Sergei Ishkov.

Photo by V. Novikov / press service of the mayor and government of Moscow