The fear of the COVID-19 pandemic has seemingly reignited upon the arrival of the brand new SARS-CoV-2 variant labeled BA.5. But is it really the worst version of the virus?

When White House medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci appeared on MSNBC earlier this week, he didn’t say anything about BA.5 being the worst strain. As an alternative, he urged the general public to proceed masking up indoors and taking caution amid the outbreak. 

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases did acknowledge that BA.5 is among the many highly contagious omicron subvariants but didn’t mention anything that might cause anyone to panic. 

He even admitted that encouraging Americans to get vaccinated and boosted can be a “hard sell” because “everybody desires to put this pandemic behind us.”

After Fauci’s statements, several news outlets reiterated his warning but opted to hype up the brand new variant by making shocking claims of their headlines, Fox News identified Friday. 

CNN ran a story Thursday with the headline, “The ‘worst variant’ is here.” The outlet cited Scripps Research professor of molecular medicine and cardiologist Eric Topol, who called BA.5 “The worst version of the virus we’ve seen.”

In comparison with the sooner versions of omicron, BA.5 “takes immune escape, already extensive, to the subsequent level, and, as a function of that, enhanced transmissibility,” Topol added. 

Fortune magazine also got here up with a surprising headline for its story in regards to the latest subvariant that read, “The rise of a latest ‘Deltacron’? BA.5 combines the worst traits of omicron with the potential for severity paying homage to Delta, experts say.”

Citing two studies, the magazine said BA.5 comes with two of omicron’s worst traits — transmissibility and immune invasion. It also added that the brand new strain affects the lungs similar to the delta variant, causing a more severe type of the infection. 

Other news outlets called the brand new variant many other things, and all of them alluded to it being the worst variant yet. The Los Angeles Times called it “dangerous,” while the Philadelphia Inquirer mentioned “super virus” in its report. 

The Day by day Beast got here up with a moniker for the brand new subvariant, calling it the “ninja” version of SARS-CoV-2 and regarding it because the “most dangerous yet.”

BA.5 is the most recent subvariant from omicron to cause widespread transmissions globally. The World Health Organization (WHO) said in its latest update that the brand new strain accounted for 52% of the cases sequenced in late June, up from 37% the week before. 

“BA.5 has a growth advantage over the opposite sublineages of Omicron which can be circulating,” WHO’s technical lead on COVID-19 Maria Van Kerkhove said. 

Though BA.5 is closely related to its sibling subvariant BA.4, the previous is alleged to be higher at evading the immune protection provided by prior infection and vaccination. Hence, it could really be the worst version of the virus yet.