Referring to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report, the NBC News reports that a new version of the Omicron variant is in the rise in the US.

“The subvariant, called BA.2.12.1, is an offshoot of the BA.2 version of omicron. While BA.2 remains the dominant variant in the U.S., BA.2.12.1 now accounts for roughly 1 in 5 new cases nationwide,” writes the NBS News.

The BA.2 variant is still reportedly the most dominant variant in the US, compromising above 75% of the total cases, however new cases with the BA.2.12.1 and yet another version called BA.2.12 are reportedly rising in the upstate New York, according to the State Department of Health.

Scientists should expect to see continued increases in the transmissibility of the virus as it continues to mutate. That’s what the selection pressure on the virus is.

– John Moore, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Weill Cornell Medical College, in Manhattan (source: NBC News)

Quoting Global variants trackers’ findings, CNN Health writes that about 21 viral offspring of the Omicron BA.2 variant have been found including these two offshoots — BA.2.12.1 and BA.2.12. New data from the CDC estimated “BA.2.12.1 caused 19% of new Covid-19 infections in the US last week, up from an estimated 11% of cases the week before and 7% the week before that”.

• New versions of Omicron variant make gains against BA.2
• A new version of omicron is gaining a foothold in the U.S., CDC finds

Andy Pekosz of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told CNN Health “And those mutations are allowing the virus to enter cells faster and also contributing to evading antibody responses that are generated from vaccination or infection”.

“What we really just don’t know right now is how much those mutations are going to be contributing to increased spread or increased disease severity. That’s something that’s going to take some time for us to figure out.”

Dr. Daniel Griffin, a physician and researcher at Columbia University Medical Center, told CNN Health “The vast majority of people in New York have either been vaccinated or infected or both. And so what we’re seeing is reinfections. We’re seeing this immune evasiveness”.

Shishi Luo, associate director of bioinformatics and infectious disease at Helix, a company that’s been tracking variants of the coronavirus, told CNN “I think it’s interesting that we were moving into a different kind of regime for SARS-CoV-2 evolution, in that the virus is able to pick up mutations that are more transmissible, at least we’ve seen three times now with Omicron. So I think from a scientific point of view, that’s interesting”.