The new Covid-19 variant, Omicron, has caused Wall Street to plunge to its worst loss this year.
The equity bloodletting came after South Africa on Thursday announced the discovery of the B.1.1.529 variant of the virus, which was met with a new cascade of travel restrictions, including by Britain and the European Union.
New York has declared a state of emergency, even though the variant hasn’t been detected yet. The order takes effect on December 3 and will be re-assessed based on the latest data on January 15.
Next week’s World Trade Organization ministerial conference, biggest gathering in four years, was postponed on Friday due to the variant.
Countries which have imposed travel restrictions include Australia, Britain, the EU, Brazil, the USA, Cyprus, Canada, Rwanda, Turkey, the UAE, the Seychelles, Guatemala, the Netherlands and Saudi Arabia.
Of concern to the National Coronavirus Command Council (NCCC) should be that added to the alarm of the variant was a dump of more than 75 000 historic test results by health department, of which 18 000 were positive cases, on Monday night.
News24 has seen data which show that some of the positive cases date back to April 2020, the beginning of the pandemic. In reality, 868 new cases were recorded on Monday night.
The South African Medical Research Council CEO, Professor Glenda Gray, has encouraged South Africans to get vaccinated before the fourth wave officially starts.
The outcomes of this NCCC meeting will give direction as to whether further consultation is required at the President’s Coordinating Council (PCC).
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