According to early data, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today that the new corona mutant omicron virus is more transportable than the delta mutant, limiting vaccine effectiveness, but causing less severe symptoms.

The World Health Organization (WHO) stated in a statement today that Omicron had spread to 63 countries as of 9 December and was more rapidly spread to South Africa, where Delta mutant dominance is lower, but also rapidly spread to Britain, where Delta prevails.

However, FAO stressed that the lack of data meant that it could not determine whether the omicron transmission rate was due to the fact that it was less susceptible to immune responses, high portability or a combination of the two.

Early evidence indicated that it caused low effectiveness of the vaccine against infection and transmission, following: "Given the current data available, it is likely to outperform the Delta variable."

To date, omicron infection has reportedly caused "mild" disease or asymptomatic conditions, but WHO said the data were insufficient to determine the clinical risk of the variant.