The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced that the circulating COVID-19 strain, EG.5, has been designated as a "variant of interest".

The fast-spreading variant, which is another descendant of Omicron, has been detected in 51 countries, including the US, UK, China and Canada.

In WHO’s risk evaluation, between 17 July and 23 July, EG.5 accounted for 17.4% of cases – a “notable rise” from the data reported four weeks prior, when the global prevalence of the variant was 7.6%.

Despite this, the agency’s risk evaluation stated that the current "available evidence does not suggest that EG.5 has additional public health risks" and that a more comprehensive evaluation is needed.

Globally, COVID-19 has caused over 6.9 million deaths, with more than 768 million cases confirmed since December 2019.

In 2020, WHO declared the outbreak a pandemic and recently ended the global emergency status for COVID-19 in May this year.

Despite its increased transmissibility, EG.5 is not any more severe than other Omicron variants, according to Maria Kerkhove, technical lead on COVID-19 at WHO.

She said: "We don't detect a change in severity of EG.5 compared to other sublineages of Omicron that have been in circulation since late 2021."

The update comes amid a drop in COVID-19 reporting, with WHO director general, Tedros Ghebreyesus, noting that despite the rise in cases, many countries were not reporting COVID-19 data to the agency. Only 11% of hospitalisations and ICU admissions related to the virus had been declared.

WHO and its Technical Advisory Group on SARs-CoV-2 Evolution have urged member states to report COVID-19 data, including mortality and morbidity, and continue offering vaccinations.

Kerkhove said that a year ago, our situation in relation to the virus to anticipate, act, or be agile was "much better" than it is now. She added that "now, the delay in our ability to do that is growing. And our ability to do this is declining".

WHO’s announcement follows reports from the UK Health Security Agency last week that provided evidence that EG.5 already accounted for one in seven cases in the UK.

Reference：
https://www.pmlive.com/pharma_news/world_health_organization_classifies_eg.5_as_a_covid-19_variant_of_interest_1496132