Oh-micron!
Is there light at the end of the tunnel?
Oh my. COVID-19 is now reportedly the third leading cause of death in the Philippines (the first cause being heart disease), and Omicron now the dominant variant.
With these numbers, is there still reason not to be infected by fear in the beginning of the third year of the pandemic?
“The not-so-bad news, fortunately for all of us, is that the kind of illness it (Omicron) brings is not as deadly as experienced with the Beta and Delta variants. Most people will have mild symptoms and need not be hospitalized,” specialist Dr. Regina Berba, an associate professor in Infectious Diseases and Internal Medicine at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) and in charge of its Hospital Infection Control Unit (HICU), told this writer.
PGH spokesman Dr. Jonas del Rosario agrees that Omicron “is less deadly than the Delta.”
The “good” news is that Omicron “has predilection for the upper respiratory tract, sparing the lungs, which means less people will have pneumonia and all its complications.”
“We are seeing fewer patients needing high-flow oxygen and mechanical ventilators,” says Del Rosario, a US-trained interventional pediatric cardiologist who is also a clinical associate professor at the UP-PGH, in an online interview with this writer.
However, Del Rosario, who has been in practice for 21 years and a spokesman for PGH since 2016, emphasizes, “The Omicron variant is currently the most transmissible version of the COVID-19 virus, with a doubling time of two days, twice more contagious than the Delta variant. It has eluded the defenses of the immune system even in vaccinated individuals and those who had previous infection. This has led to more breakthrough infections that have affected the general population, including the health care workers. As such, the number of infections has reached record numbers. Hospital admissions have skyrocketed while health care workers have been getting sick putting so much stress in the hospital capacity to take care of sick patients.”
Berba, who drives herself to The Medical City to check on her other patients after her duties at PGH, says the infections from Omicron are “unprecedented” and that the numbers reported in the Philippines are just “the tip of the iceberg.”
“The bad news is the Omicron variant is really very highly transmissible. Our numbers in the Department of Health (DOH) Dashboard for COVID-19 demonstrates this very rapid spread across households, communities and workplaces. It is more easily passed on from one person to the next.
“And I do think the numbers just represent just the tip of the iceberg — those who got tested. There are many more who are getting sick but cannot be tested anymore. So it would not be surprising if the actual number of COVID-19 cases now is many times higher than what the dashboard tells us. Indeed it’s like a tsunami of sorts. The World Health Organization (WHO) tells us that over 15 million cases of COVID-19 have been seen across the world in just the last seven days (as of press time). These numbers are unprecedented.”
I know of children, even those under five, who have caught the virus. Fortunately, none of those I know who were infected were hospitalized.
Pediatrician Dr. Francis Xavier Dimalanta, who is active in the advocacy for children with special needs, says Omicron is not the first variant to infect the little ones.
“Children have been getting infected from the original strain, although it appears that children are usually not high risk for hospitalization and death as compared to adults. However, children with co-morbidities are also at high risk of hospitalization and death. This Omicron is highly transmissible, so many times, whole families including children are getting infected,” warns Dimalanta, who is known as a “great collaborator,” reaching out to other experts in the field to benefit the families he works with.
Beginning of the end?
Too early to tell, says Del Rosario, when asked if the Omicron variant, as believed by some, is “the beginning of the end” of the coronavirus pandemic.
“I think it is premature at this time to say that this current Omicron surge is the beginning of the end of COVID. It would only happen if we don’t get another variant that has mutated to a more transmissible and or more fatal version of the Omicron. As long as we give the virus more chances to reinvent itself, this remains wishful thinking. In the meantime, we should focus on promoting vaccination and time-tested health protocols to avoid further spread of the disease,” stresses Del Rosario, a father of three.
“Who knows?” asks Dimalanta, who is appreciated by his patients’ parents for always going the extra mile. “It is so hard to predict, we hope it is the last variant. It seems to be milder than Delta, but we should not put ourselves in harm’s length and purposely get ourselves infected…”
“There’s no way to tell how long the pandemic will continue. There are many factors, including the public’s efforts to slow the spread, researchers’ work to learn more about the virus, their search for a treatment, and the success of the vaccines,” he adds.
For her part, Berba, who is one of PeopleAsia magazine’s “People of the Year” 2022 awardees, says, “I hope it is (the beginning of the end of COVID). We need not misconstrue the message in that hopeful twist.”
Hope springs eternal
With the transmissibility of Omicron, should the world bear down collectively on the pause button?
“It’s a time to slow down,” concedes Berba, a mother of seven. “If you don’t need to leave the safe bubble in your home, then stay at home. Postpone gatherings — reunions, parties, all other face-to-face events — for the next four weeks. Defer going to the grocery, mall, other similar places. Opt for open spaces if you need to get out of your home. If you need to take a public commute, make sure you wear a well-fitted mask,” advises Berba, who has been tasked by the DOH to be the country’s lead investigator for the clinical trial of Favipiravir in the treatment of COVID-19.
Keep yourself masked at all times, she cautions.
“Do not ever remove your mask while with other persons. That sort of implies (that you) also avoid altogether eating with others, even coffee, milk tea or soda. Just don’t indulge these everyday habits during this time. And most of all, when feeling sick, stay at home and away from others,” she adds.
A prayerful person, Berba is not one to lose hope. Hope is the elixir she gets when she feels “the palpable effort of people now trying to get vaccinated.”
She sees it as the light from “the tireless work of healthcare workers managing the never-ending queues of sick persons, the volunteers in teleGabay who give free teleconsultations.”
And the scientist in her (the WHO has also tapped her as the research lead for the Philippine site of its trial on risk factors for COVID among health workers) continues to be optimistic because of the “endless global efforts for new vaccines and new treatment options.”
And at the end of the day, this wife and mother finds more than a ray of sunshine despite the dark because “my own loved ones and myself are still okay.”
(You may e-mail me at [email protected]. Follow me on Instagram @joanneraeramirez.)
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