Tuguegarao City, Cagayan – The new and more contagious COVID-19 Omicron ‘Centaurus’ BA.2.75 variant has been detected by the Department of Health in the country on Tuesday, August 2.
DOH said in a presser that the new Omicron strain was confirmed from 2 COVID-19 positive patients in Central Visayas.
The health department added that the World Health Organization said the emerging variant is more transmissible and can evade immune defenses of COVID-19 vaccination.
OIC Health Secretary Maria Rosario Vergeire has made it official that the 2 individuals from Central Visayas are the first cases of the emerging variant.
Vergeire bared that both have already recovered with 1 individual partially vaccinated, while the other is unvaccinated.
The agency is still trying to get a hold of their travel histories and prior exposure.
According to DOH, the samples processed by the Philippine Genome Center to detect new variants and existing strains of COVID-19 takes up to 3 weeks or more due to high volume.
Meanwhile, it said that the new sublineage was first found in India last month and is known to have fuelled COVID-19 upticks all over the world this 2022. TNF