OTTAWA | Canada has locked its borders to all foreigners from seven southern African countries, hoping to keep at bay a new variant of COVID-19 that is giving the planet a cold sweat.
• Read also: “Several weeks” to better understand the new variant
• Read also: “It looks bad”, according to a Quebec expert
All foreign travelers from South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Eswatini and Namibia are banned from Canada until further notice, whether or not they are vaccinated .
The European Union, the United States and several Arab countries also closed their doors to them yesterday. This is not the first time since the start of the health crisis that countries have closed their borders because of the appearance of a variant.
Yesterday, the South African airport in Johannesburg was stormed by hundreds of travelers wanting to leave the country on the last available flights.
The world fears that the entire region will quickly be grappling with a new variant of the coronavirus, detected in South Africa on Thursday and dubbed Omicron yesterday. Never has a variant caused so much concern since the emergence of the Delta a year ago in India.
“The pandemic is not over yet. This is a reminder that we must remain cautious, ”insisted Federal Minister of Transport Omar Alghabra.
In quarantine at the hotel
Since there are no direct flights from this part of the world to Canada, Canadians and permanent residents who wish to return will have to transit through another country and be tested there before flying to Canada.
They will need to be tested again upon arrival and await the results at a federally designated hotel. If their test is negative, they will be allowed to self-isolate at home for 14 days.
Reuters Pictures
Travelers wanting to travel to London encountered closed counters at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg, South Africa. In mortise, a traveler who is tested at the same airport before taking her flight.
“It may seem exaggerated to some, but it is really to make sure to be as careful as possible,” said Federal Minister of Health Jean-Yves Duclos, defending the government’s “belt and sling” approach. in front of a variant about which we still know little.
Track 700 travelers to Canada
As for travelers who have returned to the country from this region of the globe in the past two weeks, they are ordered to be screened and isolate themselves for 14 days “immediately”.
About 50 people arrive daily from southern African countries via a transit country. Public Health must therefore trace some 700 travelers who have arrived two weeks ago.
“We have the tools now, including ArriveCAN [plateforme internet], to locate these people, ”assured Dr. Theresa Tam, the chief federal public health administrator, before calling on the population to be extra careful with the approach of holiday gatherings.
In reaction, the stock markets all plunged yesterday. Markets fear the global economy is once again crippled and supply chains shaken even more than they already are.
- Listen to the analysis of virologist Benoit Barbeau on QUB radio
A new threat
A new highly contagious variant from South Africa is putting the planet back into a state of alert. Called Omicron, it worries the experts, who call for vigilance.
- Hugo Duchaine, The Journal of Montreal
Very virulent
“It is believed that in some regions [d’Afrique du Sud], it could represent 75% of all the sequences analyzed. It is a sign of efficient transmission. It makes you fear for the rest of things, ”says Alain Lamarre, professor-researcher in immunology and virology at the National Institute for Scientific Research (INRS).
3e dose as soon as possible
“The more people we have vaccinated, the less chance we will give to variants to emerge”, underlines Mme Borges Da Silva, encouraging worldwide immunization. On the other hand, the Dr Weiss points out that several countries are more reluctant to vaccinate. In southern Africa, the vaccination rate is around 20% compared to over 75% in Canada.
For now, the two experts are calling for a third dose as quickly as possible in all people who have been vaccinated for more than six months, but especially for people with immunosuppression and healthcare workers.
More resistant to the vaccine?
” [Le variant Omicron] seems more contagious, but is it more severe? We don’t know anything yet, ”emphasizes Roxane Borgès Da Silva, professor at the School of Public Health at the University of Montreal.
She adds that the Delta variant, which quickly spread across the world, was not resistant to the vaccine, as evidenced by the epidemiological situation in Quebec.
For virologist Benoît Barbeau, “the most pressing question” will be to know the impact of the numerous mutations of the variant on vaccine protection.
Already research
The German laboratory BioNTech, allied with Pfizer, said to study the new variant and to wait “at the latest in two weeks” of first results of studies which will make it possible to determine if it is able to escape the vaccine protection.
For its part, Moderna has announced its intention to develop a specific booster dose for it.
Hard to control
“It is not only inevitable that he will be in Canada, but he is very probably already here,” said virologist Benoît Barbeau. Even if for the moment the authorities assure that it has not been detected in the country, the variant is spreading rapidly.
South Africa, which observed around 200 cases of COVID-19 per day, recently saw daily new infections reach more than 2,000 cases.
More than 30 mutations
From a genetic point of view, the Omicron variant has an unusually high number of mutations, including about thirty in the spike protein, which is the key to entry of the virus into the body. The Delta variant, which has spread like wildfire in recent months, only has two.
For microbiologist Karl Weiss, it is not surprising to see a variant appear in South Africa, where there is a large population that is immunosuppressed and untreated (against HIV) and living in difficult sanitary conditions.
– With the QMI Agency