With new COVID variant, South Africans should prioritise hygiene again

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared a new COVID-19 variant, which it says is likely to cause a spike in infections but not increased severity.

The variant has been designated the letter E and goes by the name EG.5 which has also been called Eris.

There are no reported cases of the new variant in South Africa.

The association's Dr Mvuyisi Mzukwa: "That’s what the experts, virologists are telling us, that you know this is fairly quite transmissible, more than the other sub-variants and you can imagine then that many people will be infected and actually it will transmit to many other countries that we know."

Mzukwa said information suggested this variant was not dangerous.

“Except for the fact that it depends on who is infected. For example, if you have somebody who is having underlying medical conditions like diabetics and others, or kidney failure, the heart failure and you are above the age of 65, so those are the risk factors that could lead to them being infected by this virus.”