BA.5 Omicron is winning the battle of the Covid variant in the United States, particularly in the Southwest

The Omicron BA.5 variant, first unveiled in South Africa on February 26, now appears to be gaining ground in the competition for dominance in the United States.

Three variants of Covid are currently on the rise as the country experiences a spike in cases in the summer. They are all members of the Omicron family. Although BA.5 still accounts for only 7.6% of cases in the country, according to data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, today it is clearly making more weekly earnings than any other option. Similar trends have repeatedly led to other Omicron strains becoming dominant in the United States.

The current dominant variant BA.2.12.1, which reached this state just two weeks ago, now represents 62.2% of new positive cases in the United States where the variant has been detected.

Last week, BA.2.12.1 accounted for 59% of the variants identified. This is a 5.4% increase from last week. The week before BA.2.12.1 saw an overall increase of around 7%.

But BA.5 increased from 4.2% to 7.6% last week, from 85% last week. That’s even more than the 74% increase the South African variant saw accelerating a week ago.

The sister offspring of BA.4, first detected in South Africa in January, increased from 3.3% to 5.4% in the sequence of all variants last week. This is a significant increase from 64%, but not equal to BA.5. See the diagram below.

South African variants have increased their share even more rapidly in the Southwest, particularly Texas and New Mexico, where together they already account for a quarter of all new cases, at 22.2%. See map below.

In these two states, BA.5 was detected in 13.2% of new cases tested for variants this week. That’s a 71% increase from BA.5’s 7.7% turnout last week. Compare that to BA.2.12.1, which increased from 52% of all new cases to 53% this week, up just 2%, and it’s clear which option has an advantage going forward.

What gives BA.5 and BA.4 an advantage? Although BA.2.12.1 has gained the advantage of being more contagious than before BA.2, the two new variants are said to be outdated, at least in part, due to their reinfectability.

“We are now drawing conclusions from a systematic antigen analysis of these growing Omicron sub-variants,” says the latest analysis. BioRxiv Preprint Server released. BA.2.12.1 is only slightly (1.8 times) more resistant to sera from spiked and vaccinated individuals than BA.2. “On the other hand, BA.4 / 5 is substantially (4.2 times) more resistant and therefore more likely to cause vaccine deterioration infections.”

If true, this means that the newer variants have a much larger population that they can potentially access, as older variants such as BA.2.12.1 produce far fewer discoveries.