Don’t panic about new SARS-CoV-2 variant, experts say

In the leafy Johannesburg suburb of Sandringham, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) bears a deceptive facade.

Do not be fooled by its sleepy campus, clustered face brick buildings and shade-cloth parking, this government facility is home to state-of-the-art biosafety laboratories and some of South Africa’s top virologists, microbiologists and epidemiologists. Here, 71 scientists are tasked daily with laboratory-based disease surveillance to protect the country from pathogen outbreak events.

On 5 March 2020, then health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize announced South Africa’s first Covid infection at an NICD press briefing. At the time, the NICD was an obscure acronym for many, but that quickly changed as the institution became central to the country’s pandemic response.

While the Covid pandemic may have waned, the NICD hasn’t stopped monitoring.

That is because there remains a global public health risk associated with Covid. The World Health Organization (WHO) states:

“There has been evidence of decreasing impact on human health throughout 2023 and 2024 compared to 2020-2023, driven mainly by:

1. High levels of population immunity, achieved through infection, vaccination, or both;
2. Similar virulence of currently circulating JN.1 sublineages of the SARS-CoV-2 virus as compared with previously circulating Omicron sublineages; and
3. The availability of diagnostic tests and improved clinical case management. SARS-CoV-2 circulation nevertheless continues at considerable levels in many areas, as indicated in regional trends, without any established seasonality and with unpredictable evolutionary patterns.”

Thus, while SARS-CoV-2 is still circulating, it is clearly not making remotely as many people ill or claiming nearly as many lives as it did four years ago. Asked about this, Foster Mohale, spokesperson for the National Department of Health, says, “There are no reports of people getting severely sick and dying due to Covid in South Africa at the current moment.”

‘Variant under monitoring’

As SARS-CoV-2 circulates, it continues to mutate. The WHO recently designated variant NB.1.8.1 as a new variant under monitoring. There is, however, no reason for alarm. Professor Anne von Gottberg, laboratory head at the NICD’s Centre for Respiratory Diseases and Meningitis, tells Spotlight that NB.1.8.1 is not a cause for panic, particularly not in South Africa.

Von Gottberg says no cases of the new variant have been detected in South Africa. She refers to her unit’s latest surveillance of respiratory pathogens report for the week of 2 to 8 June 2025. It states that out of 189 samples tested, 41 (21.7%) cases were influenza, another 41 (21.7%) cases were respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and three (1.6%) cases were earlier strains of SARS-CoV-2.

These figures suggest much greater circulation of influenza and RSV in South Africa than SARS-CoV-2. Over the past six months, 3,258 samples were tested, revealing 349 (10.7%) cases of influenza, 530 (16.3%) cases of RSV, and 106 (3.3%) cases of SARS-CoV-2. Since most people who become sick because of these viruses are not tested, these figures do not paint the whole picture of what is happening in the country.

As of 23 May 2025, the WHO considered the public health risk of NB.1.8.1 to be “low at the global level”, with 518 iterations of the variant submitted from 22 countries, mainly around Asia and the Pacific islands.

The WHO report states: “NB.1.8.1 exhibits only marginal additional immune evasion over LP.8.1 [first detected in July 2024]. While there are reported increases in cases and hospitalisations in some of the WPR [Western Pacific Region] countries, which has the highest proportion of NB.1.8.1, there are no reports to suggest that the associated disease severity is higher as compared to other circulating variants. The available evidence on NB.1.8.1 does not suggest additional public health risks relative to the other currently circulating Omicron descendent lineages.”

Combating misinformation

Von Gottberg says that the NICD plays a critical public health communication role in combating misinformation and warns against alarmist and inaccurate online depictions of NB.1.8.1, the Omicron-descendent lineage dubbed “Nimbus” by some commentators.

“There’s fake news about NB.1.8.1 going around on social media,” she says. “For example, supposed symptoms. I have been trying to look for articles and have not seen anything from [reliable sources],” she says. “In fact, there is no information about whether there are any differences in symptoms, because there are so few cases and it is not causing more severe disease.”

Von Gottberg implores members of the public to check information sources. “We try hard – and the Department of Health does the same – to put media releases out so that accurate information is shared. What we ask is that all our clients, the public, verify information before they start retweeting or resending.”

Covid vaccines in South Africa

The WHO recommends that countries ensure continued equitable access to and uptake of Covid vaccines. They also note that the currently approved Covid vaccines are expected to remain effective against the new variant. But contrary to WHO advice, newer Covid vaccines are not available in South Africa and continued access to older vaccinations seems to have ceased. When Spotlight called two branches of two major pharmacy retailers in Cape Town, asking for available Covid vaccines, the answer at both was that they had none.

Several recently approved Covid vaccines are being used in other countries but are not available in South Africa. These include Moderna’s updated mRNA boosters, approved in the United States and parts of Europe, Novavax’s Nuvaxovid vaccine, approved in the United States, and Arcturus Therapeutics’s self-amplifying mRNA vaccine Zapomeran, approved in Europe. Self-amplifying mRNA vaccines have the additional capacity to induce longer-lasting immune responses by replicating the spike-proteins of SARS-CoV-2.

None of these vaccines are under review for registration in South Africa, according to the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (Sahpra). Vaccines may not be made available in the country without the green light from Sahpra. “It may be advisable to contact the owners of the vaccines to obtain clarity on whether they intend to submit for registration,” says Sahpra spokesperson Yuven Gounden.

Spotlight on Friday sent questions to Moderna, Novavax and Arcturus, asking whether they planned to submit their vaccines for registration with Sahpra, and if not, why not. None of the companies responded by the time of publication.

Von Gottberg explains that vaccines can become available in South Africa only if their manufacturers submit them to Sahpra for approval. “So, if a vaccine provider, a vaccine manufacturer, does not want to sell in our country because they do not see it as a lucrative market, they may not even put it forward for regulation so that it can be made available.”

Professor of Vaccinology at the University of the Witwatersrand, Shabir Madhi, says the major concern with the lack of licensed SARS-CoV-2 vaccines in South Africa is that “high-risk individuals remain susceptible to severe Covid, as there is waning of immunity”.

“High-risk individuals should receive a booster dose every 6-12 months, preferably with the vaccine that is updated against current or most recent variants,” he says.

Von Gottberg has similar concerns. “My hope as a public health professional is that these vaccine manufacturers take us seriously as a market in South Africa and in Africa, very importantly, and put these vaccines and products through our regulatory authorities so that they can be made available both in the public and in the private sector for all individuals who are at risk and should be receiving these vaccines,” she says.

Gounden notes that should a public health need arise, “Sahpra is ready to respond in terms of emergency use approval.”

Concerns over vaccine expert dismissals in the United States

Earlier this month in the United States, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. fired all 17 members of the Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices (ACIP) – an expert body responsible for recommending vaccines for 60 years. He then appointed eight new members, some known for vaccine scepticism.

Commenting on this, Von Gottberg says: “I am hoping there will be those who will think about what he [Kennedy] is doing and question it. It is an unusual situation in the United States, you cannot call it business as usual.”

In an article published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, former ACIP members voice grave concerns over the dismissals. “Vaccines are one of the greatest global public health achievements. Vaccine recommendations have been critical to the global eradication of smallpox and the elimination of polio, measles, rubella, and congenital rubella syndrome in the US.

“They have also dramatically decreased cases of hepatitis, meningitis, mumps, pertussis (whooping cough), pneumonia, tetanus, and varicella (chickenpox), and prevented cancers caused by hepatitis B virus and human papilloma viruses. Recent scientific advancements enabled the accelerated development, production and evaluation of Covid vaccines…” they write.

The article also questioned the announcement by Kennedy Jr on X that he had signed a directive to withdraw the recommendation for Covid vaccination in healthy children and healthy pregnant people.

“[R]ecent changes to Covid vaccine policy, made directly by the HHS secretary and released on social media, appear to have bypassed the standard, transparent and evidence-based review process. Such actions reflect a troubling disregard for the scientific integrity that has historically guided US immunisation strategy,” the authors warn.

Von Gottberg adds: “We hope that this anti-vax, the denialism of vaccines and the good they do, won’t come to South Africa.”

In addition, she cautions public healthcare professionals to take heed of this discourse.

“We must take seriously that people have questions, and that they want to see us doing things correctly, transparently, always telling people of our conflicts of interest, being very upfront when things are controversial, when it’s difficult to make decisions,” she says

“So I think what this teaches us is not to be complacent in the way we talk and write about vaccines, discuss vaccines, and we must take our clients, the public out there, seriously and hear their voices, listen to their questions.” DM

This article was first published by Spotlight – health journalism in the public interest. Sign up to the Spotlight newsletter.