A new coronavirus variant, which has been named XBB, has now become the dominant form of COVID-19 in the northeastern part of the country and is expected to become the dominant variant worldwide.
The XBB variant, which accounted for only 11% of COVID cases in the region just two weeks ago, now makes up over half of all cases (52.6%). This is higher than the 18% of cases XBB accounts for across the entire U.S.
“The sudden increase in XBB is pretty striking,” Dr. Shira Doron of Tufts Medical Center says. “I wasn’t expecting it because it had been smoldering on the chart for a while.”
Here’s everything you need to know about the variant.
1. It can evade immunity
Is XBB more transmissible? According to experts, the rapid spread of the XBB variant suggests it’s more adept than its predecessors at evading the immunity that comes from vaccines and infections.
“The most likely explanation is that it’s more transmissible,” says Dr. Jeremy Luban, professor of molecular medicine, biochemistry, and molecular biotechnology at UMass Chan Medical School, in a recent interview.
“I think it’s like we’ve been seeing essentially since last December or January, that subvariants of Omicron continue to emerge,” adds Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes of Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “Each one that replaces the previous one is doing so either because it is more transmissible or because it is able to evade the immune response generated by the previous variant, which is more or less what viruses tend to do overall.”
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2. The immunocompromised face a greater risk
Similar to the previous variants, those who are immunocompromised face the greater risk. Unforuntanetly, the monoclonal antibodies used to treat those who are immunocompromised do not work against the latest variants, including XBB. Due to this,
