WHO: peak of omicron wave remains "a number of weeks" away

WHO’s emergencies director Mike Ryan said that the vaccines are not failing and do provide significant protection against severe disease and death.

"The question is how much protection are the current vaccines that we are using, which are currently life-saving against all the variants, and to what extent do we lose any protection against severe illness and death against Omicron. The data is pointing towards there being significant protection," Reuters cited him as saying.

Ryan said the peak of this wave of infections remains "a number of weeks" away given the very rapid spread of the Omicron variant, which has outpaced the dominant global strain Delta.