As more countries look to tread carefully on the XE recombinant variant, the World Health Organization has clarified on reports of its greater transmissibility.

It is 10 per cent more transmissible, not 10 times more, the WHO said, toning down the fear-factor by a few notches.

“Some media have misreported the potential growth advantage of 10 per cent as 10 times. This is incorrect. If the 10 per cent increase in growth is confirmed, this variant would be 1.1 times more transmissible, not 10 times,” the UN health agency said.

The XE recombinant combines the BA.1 and BA.2 strains of the Omicron variant. It was first detected in the United Kingdom mid-January and a few hundred sequences have been reported and confirmed since.

“Early estimates based on limited preliminary data suggest that XE has a community growth rate advantage of about 10 per cent as compared to BA.2; however, this finding requires further confirmation,” the WHO said.

Planet’s health

Separately, on the occasion of World Health Day (April 7), the WHO called on leaders and people to preserve and protect health and mitigate the climate crisis as part of an “Our planet, our health” campaign.

About 99 per cent of people breathe in unhealthy air, mainly resulting from the burning of fossil fuels, the WHO said.

“A heating world is seeing mosquitos spread diseases further and faster than ever before. Extreme weather events, biodiversity loss, land degradation and water scarcity are displacing people and affecting their health. Pollution and plastics are found at the bottom of our deepest oceans, the highest mountains, and have made their way into our food chain and blood stream. Systems that produce highly processed unhealthy foods and beverages are driving a wave of obesity, increasing cancer and heart disease while generating up to one-third of global greenhouse gas emissions. This health and social crisis is compromising people’s ability to take control over their health and lives,” the agency said.

“The climate crisis is a health crisis: the same unsustainable choices that are killing our planet are killing people,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

WHO’s manifesto to ensure a healthy and green recovery from Covid-19 prescribes protecting and preserving nature as the source of human health, investing in essential services — from water and sanitation to clean energy in healthcare facilities, ensuring a quick and healthy energy transition, promoting healthy and sustainable food systems, building healthy and livable cities, and stopping the use of taxpayers’ money to fund pollution, the note said.

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