The speed with which new variants of the COVID-19 virus spread around the world can leave government’s scrambling to catch up. What is sometimes more remarkable is the speed with which those new variants are detected.
It has taken barely two weeks from the initial testing of ‘patient zero’, before potentially the entire globe is readying itself to examine COVID test samples to see if they contain the Omicron variant.
Patient zero, called n=1 or the index case by the scientific community, arrived at Hong Kong International Airport on 11 November, having flown in from South Africa via Doha in Qatar, on flight QR818.
He had been in South Africa for almost three weeks, and had tested negative the day before he began his trip there.
On his return to the territory on the Qatar Airways flight, the 36-year-old was in seat 31A, and was showing no symptoms when he checked into the Regal Airport Hotel in Chek Lap Kok, to begin his mandatory quarantine. He also tested negative on his return.
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Hong Kong has some of the most stringent regulations on arrival in the world.
Anyone coming from a “high-risk” country can only board flights for the territory if they are fully-vaccinated Hong Kong residents and even then they have to undergo compulsory isolation for 21 days in a designated quarantine hotel when they arrive.
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While in quarantine, they must undergo six COVID tests and then they must monitor themselves for the following seven days, after which they are tested again 26 days after the day of their arrival.
The man in question had fulfilled all the requirements, having received the Pfizer vaccine on 13 May and 4 June, and outwardly there were no signs his case was anything unusual.
But two days into his quarantine, he was tested again, on 13 November, and after showing a high viral load was sent to hospital the next day.
Meanwhile, another passenger that had arrived in Hong Kong the day before the man who later became patient zero, was staying in a room opposite him on the fifth floor of the same quarantine hotel.
He tested negative twice before, on 18 November, a result showed he too had a high viral load and he was also rushed to hospital.
Like all arrivals who test positive after coming to Hong Kong, they were give case numbers – 12388 and 12404.
Early conclusions from Hong Kong’s health authorities were that case 12404 might have been infected with the variant as air flowed into the corridor when case 12388 opened his hotel room door as he was not wearing a surgical mask.
While the test results from the Hong Kong travellers were being analysed, other researchers in South Africa and Botswana were also looking into a newly emerging variant.
Just three days after the Hong Kong traveller went to his quarantine hotel, a number of people were being routinely tested in the South African province of Gauteng.
At around the same time, South Africa, and particularly Gauteng, began to see a sudden uptick in cases.
South African scientists began to come to the conclusion they were seeing something new after detecting a group of related SARS-CoV-2 viruses that were turning up in large numbers, compared to other variants.
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What is the new COVID variant?
Out of the specimens collected between 14 and 23 November, more than 70% were of the same type.
They raised the alarm on 22 November.
The next day the new variant was picked up by GISAID, the open-access database of flu viruses and coronavirus variants that has been critical to spreading news around the world about emerging forms of COVID-19.
On 24 November, it was given a new name under the criteria given to emerging COVID variants – B.1.1.529.
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Scotland and Wales are calling for all UK travellers to isolate for eight days when arriving in the country.
On the same day, the new variant was reported to the World Health Organisation, which convened its technical advisory group – similar to WHO’s equivalent to SAGE – to assess what should be done.
The UK, responding to the rapidly evolving situation, designated the virus type a variant under investigation, VUI-21NOV-01, on 25 November.
As it did so, cases in South Africa were shooting up.
Professor Sharon Peacock of COG-UK Genomics UK Consortium, which oversees sequencing in the UK, said on Friday: “The number of recorded COVID-19 infections on 16 November 2021 was 273 cases. By 25 November this had risen to more than 1,200 cases.
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Health minister Edward Argar says Omicron cases will rise across the UK in the run-up to Christmas.
“More than 80% of these were from Gauteng province. Cases in Gauteng province initially appeared to be clustered, but over time there has been more widespread dispersal of infections across the province.
“An analysis of the R value (a measure of growth rate) is 1.47 for South Africa as a whole, but initial estimates for Gauteng province are 1.93. Based on this measurement, it indicates that growth rate of cases is considerably higher in Gauteng province than the rest of the country.
“Around 100 B.1.1.529 genomes have now been identified in South Africa, mostly from Gauteng province. But this region is also where the sequencing has been targeted, and the question is whether the variant is present over a wider geographic area.”
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South Africa’s president says Omicron is now responsible for the majority of cases in the country’s most populated area.
In total, according to the European Centre for Disease Control, South African investigators examined 77 samples in Gauteng taken between 12 and 20 November looking for a specific mutation that suggested Omicron was present, and found it in all cases.
The results, say the ECDC, suggest that Omicron is already dominant in Gauteng and is present in significant proportions in most parts of South Africa.
The question is, what does this mean for the rest of the world?
It is clear that Omicron has been in the UK for several days.
After one of the first cases in England was revealed to have been identified in Brentwood, Essex County Council said staff, customers and delivery workers who visited a branch of KFC on Brentwood High Street on Friday 19 November, between 1pm and 5pm, should take a PCR test immediately – suggesting a person with the variant was in the restaurant at the time.
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Sky’s Charlotte Lomas looks at what scientists know so far about the Omicron COVID variant and how it behaves.
Likewise, they asked anyone in the congregation of the town’s Trinity Church on Sunday 21 November to do the same.
Essex’s director of public health Dr Mike Gogarty told the BBC’s World At One programme that the person in question was tested on 20 November and has contracted the variant from someone who had been in contact with someone who had been to South Africa – in a clear case of community transmission.
He said: “We are talking probably about two weeks from now since that person returned from Africa.”
Both the UK cases identified on Saturday, which also included one in Nottingham, were linked to travel in South Africa. A third case in the London borough of Westminster, who had previously been in southern Africa, has since left the country.
But while South Africa, like the UK, has an effective system to sequence COVID test samples, many other countries in Africa do not.
Omicron has been detected early in Botswana, but there are concerns it may be widespread in several other nations in southern Africa.
Some 98 samples were sequenced in Botswana to allow the identification of six cases of Omicron by Friday, reported the ECDC, but in the same period countries like Kenya sequenced just five cases, with no Omicron cases.
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Dr Chaand Nagpaul says there needs to be a consistent policy in mask wearing in public.
Israel, one of the world’s most vaccinated countries, said on Friday it had also detected the country’s first case of Omicron in a traveller who had returned from Malawi. Two other suspected cases were also placed in isolation.
On that day, as the world became aware of the extent of the spread, markets reacted with oil prices plunging and airlines shares suffering major losses.
A case was also confirmed in Belgium and on Saturday suspected cases were reported in Germany, Italy and the Czech Republic.
Denmark and Australia announced two cases and the Netherlands identified 13 Omicron cases in dozens of COVID-positive travellers from South Africa on Sunday.
On Monday, further cases were announced in Portugal, where 13 players and staff members of Lisbon soccer team Belenenses were found to be positive for the variant even though only one player had been recently to South Africa.
Countries across the planet have reacted by closing their borders or reintroducing severe travel restrictions.
While scientists have raised the alarm, and have said they expected it to spread, many say there is no more cause for concern in terms of the impact on people, than there might have been if the Delta variant stays dominant.
Reacting to the news cases had been discovered in Scotland, Professor Rowland Kao, the Sir Timothy O’Shea Professor of Veterinary Epidemiology and Data Science at the University of Edinburgh, said: “It is now clear that the Omicron variant has been spreading around the world for some days, if not weeks prior to the alarms being raised, and this is only to be expected for a virus which transmits as easily as SARS-CoV-2, and with international travel now substantial (even though not quite at the level pre-pandemic).
“Evidence of community spread in two locations in Scotland (ie cases with no obvious risks other than community spread) and no obvious source yet, are strong indicators that we shall see more cases in Scotland arise over the next few days and weeks.
“As always, anything individuals can do to mitigate spread (physical distancing, taking lateral flow tests when appropriate and being aware of COVID symptoms and testing) will be beneficial.
“However it is important to remember that the omicron variant may not pose an increased health risk – it may in fact cause milder infections. However we shall only know for sure in the next few weeks.”
A second Australian teenager has died after being poisoned with methanol in Laos, bringing the number of people killed to six.
Holly Bowles, 19, has died, according to the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Senator Penny Wong, who said: “All Australians will be heartbroken by the tragic passing of Holly Bowles. I offer my deepest sympathies to her family and friends.”
Bianca Jones, who according to Australian authorities was Ms Bowles’s best friend, died earlier this week after both 19-year-olds fell ill on 13 November while staying in southeast Asian country.
They are two of six people who are believed to have died after drinking methanol-laced vodka in the tourist hotspot.
The death of British woman Simone White, 28, from Orpington, Kent, was announced on Thursday. She fell ill after reportedly drinking “free shots” from a local bar in Vang Vieng – a resort popular with backpackers.
Two Danish women in their 20s and a 56-year-old US citizen also died as a result of the mass poisoning.
Methanol, which is sometimes added to mixed drinks as a cheaper alternative to alcohol, but can cause severe poisoning or death.
The manager and owner of the hostel where the two Australians, both from Melbourne, were staying, has been detained, according to an officer at Vang Vieng’s Tourism Police office who refused to give his name.
This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.
Arrest warrants have been issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former defence secretary Yoav Gallant and a senior Hamas commander by the International Criminal Court (ICC).
The warrants against the senior Israeli figures are for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity related to the war in Gaza that Israel launched following the 7 October attacks by Hamas.
The prime minister’s office said the warrants against him and Gallant were “anti-semitic” and said Israel “rejects with disgust the absurd and false actions”.
Another warrant was issued for the arrest of Hamas leader Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al Masrifor alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Neither Israel nor the US are members of the ICC. Israel has rejected the court’s jurisdiction and denies committing war crimes in Gaza.
US President Joe Biden described the warrants against Israeli leaders as “outrageous”, adding “whatever the ICC might imply, there is no equivalence – none – between Israel and Hamas”.
Former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett said the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant were a “mark of shame” for the ICC.
The court originally said it was seeking arrest warrants for the three men in May for the alleged crimes and today announced that it had rejected challenges by Israel and issued warrants of arrest.
In its update, the ICC said it found “reasonable grounds to believe” that Netanyahu and Gallant “bear criminal responsibility” for alleged crimes.
These, the court said, include “the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.
The Board of Deputies of British Jews said the ICC’s decision sent a “terrible message”.
“The court has minimised how Hamas fights – deliberately from within civilian infrastructure and cruelly using Palestinian civilians as human shields, tragically leading to many casualties,” the board said.
“Democratic governments, and people around the world, should consider how they would have responded to an October 7th perpetrated against their country, involving mass murder, rape, and hostage-taking.
“We should all be focused on defeating the Hamas terrorists, liberating the hostages, ensuring that civilians in Gaza receive all necessary aid and working towards a sustainable peace for Israelis and Palestinians to prevent these horrible conflicts in the future.
“The decision of the ICC is counter-productive in all these respects.”
Three arrest warrants have been issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) but the two most significant are those against Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant.
The court in their statement said that they have reasonable grounds to believe that those two men, have been carrying out the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution and other inhumane acts.
Ever since the arrest warrants were first sought there have been a lot of legal challenges. But the court has rejected all that and has now issued these arrest warrants.
So what does it mean? Well, practically, it would mean that Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant couldn’t travel to any state that is a signatory of the ICC – about 120 countries around the world, including the UK and many European countries.
Were Netanyahu to travel to any of those countries, he should be arrested by the police forces of those countries. And it’ll be very interesting to see what Sir Keir Starmer’s reaction is to this.
But the US, Israel’s closest ally, is not a signatory of the ICC. I think Netanyahu will have support on the other side of the Atlantic.
Also, these ICC arrest warrants don’t always get carried out. We saw President Vladimir Putin, who had an arrest warrant issued for him after the invasion of Ukraine, travel to Mongolia a couple of months ago and nothing was done about that.
But in terms of the reputations of Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, in terms of that legacy, they are now wanted suspects, wanted to be put on trial for war crimes. And it is a label that will never leave them.
Warrant for Hamas leader
The ICC also said it has issued an arrest warrant for Hamas leader Al Masri, saying it has “reasonable grounds to believe” that he is responsible for crimes against humanity including murder, extermination, torture, rape, as well as war crimes including taking hostages.
Discussing the 7 October attacks, the court said: “In light of the coordinated killings of members of civilians at several separate locations, the Chamber also found that the conduct took place as part of a mass killing of members of the civilian population, and it therefore concluded that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the crime against humanity of extermination was committed.”
In its statement, the ICC said the prosecution was not in a position to determine whether Al Masri is dead or alive, so was issuing the arrest warrant.
The court previously said it was seeking an arrest warrant for Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas who was subsequently killed in July.
Simone White, 28, from Orpington, Kent, fell ill after reportedly drinking “free shots” from a local bar in Vang Vieng – a resort popular with backpackers.
Four people had already died following the suspected poisonings – an Australian named Bianca Jones, 19, from Melbourne, as well as two Danish women in their 20s and a 56-year-old US citizen.
They are believed to have consumed drinks tainted with methanol, which is sometimes added to mixed drinks as a cheaper alternative to alcohol, but can cause severe poisoning or death.
“We are supporting the family of a British woman who has died in Laos, and we are in contact with the local authorities,” the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said in a statement.
The FCDO said it was also providing consular assistance to other British nationals hospitalised in the incident, as well as their families.
Ms White was an associate lawyer specialising in intellectual property and technology and worked at the London office of the American law firm Squire Patton Boggs.
Her work involved general commercial matters, and contentious and non-contentious intellectual property law issues, according to the firm’s website.
Bethany Clarke, a friend of Ms White and a healthcare worker, also from Orpington, said a group of six people had been taken to hospital after drinking from the same bar.
She posted on a Laos Backpacking Facebook group to warn other travellers after the group fell ill.
“Urgent – please avoid all local spirits. Our group stayed in Vang Vieng and we drank free shots offered by one of the bars,” she wrote.
“Just avoid them as so not worth it. Six of us who drank from the same place are in hospital currently with methanol poisoning.”
‘Every parent’s very worst fear’
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese confirmed to his country’s parliament that 19-year-old Bianca Jones had died after being evacuated to a Thai hospital from Vang Vieng.
Thai authorities confirmed Jones had died of “brain swelling due to high levels of methanol found in her system”.
Her friend Holly Bowles, also 19, remains in hospital in neighbouring Thailand, Mr Albanese said.
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Laos methanol poisonings – what we know
Australian officials said “several foreign nationals” had also been victims of methanol poisoning
“This is every parent’s very worst fear and a nightmare that no one should have to endure,” Mr Albanese said.
“We also take this moment to say that we’re thinking of Bianca’s friend Holly Bowles who is fighting for her life.”
‘Her incredible spirit touched so many lives’
In a statement to the Melbourne Herald Sun newspaper, Ms Jones’ family paid tribute to her.
“She was surrounded by love, and we are comforted by the knowledge that her incredible spirit touched so many lives during her time with us,” the family wrote.
“We want to express our deepest gratitude for the overwhelming support, love, and prayers we’ve received from across Australia.”
The US State Department confirmed an American had also died in Vang Vieng, and Denmark’s Foreign Ministry said two of its citizens had also died in “the incident in Laos”.
Neither would comment directly on a link to methanol poisoning.