Dr. Howard Smith Oncall

  Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/N4qAzhE8v9s   The OmicronBA.2 subvariant is spreading rapidly, and it will trigger another wave, actually a tsunami, of CoVid cases.  I am here to warn you, not to scare you, but if a 4 alarm siren is what you need, so be it.   I’ve been talking about this OmicronBA.2 subvariant for several weeks now as it has been spreading around Europe and is wreaking havoc in Hong Kong and mainland China.  This subvariant has a transmissability factor, a so-called R0, of about 12.  This puts the OmicronBA.2 in a class with the most infectious virus known to man, the measles virus, with R0s ranging from 12 to 18.  OmicronBA.2 is easy to catch, even outdoors, in a crowd, and certainly indoors.   But wait, I’m vaccinated and boosted you say.   So am I, and I continue to be worried.  Why?  Because, the protective antibodies triggered by even the best of our Covid vaccines, the mRNA Pfizer and Moderna, don’t protect against OmicronBA.2 that well, say only about 40-50%, and the protection they do of