A new family of COVID variants is on the rise in the U.S. and abroad—one experts say is likely responsible for a rising tide of infections and hospitalizations.
The World Health Organization recently designated EG.5 a “variant under monitoring” due to its steady global growth. Reports of EG.5, detected in 45 countries so far, nearly doubled from mid-June through mid-July, according to an Aug. 3 WHO situation report.
In the U.S., EG.5 and its spin-offs are now the most common COVID variants, according to the latest projections issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The viral family was estimated to account for 17.3% of cases in the country as of Friday. Meanwhile, COVID hospitalizations have risen nearly 13% over the past two weeks, according to CDC data. And levels of the virus in wastewater have already crested into a half-wave, albeit a relatively small one.
Experts are keeping their eye on EG.5 “child” variant EG.5.1 (dubbed “Eris” by variant trackers, after the second-largest known dwarf planet in the solar system). EG.5.1 is taking off in the U.S.—it’s responsible for nearly 8.5% of sequenced cases over the past three weeks, according to GISAID, an international research organization that tracks changes in COVID and the flu virus. Levels are also rising in Europe and Asia, Dr. Eric Topol, a professor of molecular medicine at Scripps Research and founder and director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, wrote in a Sunday blog entry.
With testing and sequencing at all time-lows, it’s impossible to say for certain whether EG.5.1 is fueling the current rise in cases in the U.S. and abroad. But “it certainly does not look benign,” Topol wrote.
Some locations like New York City “are already seeing upticks in the number of COVID-19 cases, and we should expect that we might see similar increases in cases in other parts of the country,” Talia Quandelacy, assistant professor of epidemiology at the Colorado School of Public Health and a member of the state’s COVID modeling group, told Fortune.
“We could see COVID-19 cases increasing around the same time as flu season (October to May) if we don’t see cases increasing earlier from a new variant,” she added.
Symptom-wise, it’s too early to say if EG.5.1 is any different from other Omicron strains. And the variant may not cause a large wave of cases, according to Ryan Gregory, a biology professor at the University of Guelph in Ontario. He’s been assigning “street names” to high-flying variants since the WHO stopped assigning new Greek letters to them.
“My best guess is we’re heading back up to a high baseline [of cases] that may stay up there, but probably not a huge wave,” he tells Fortune. “The past year has been about rising sea level, not tsunamis.”