COVID-19 cases in the UK, which has again reached record levels, with about 1 in 13 people estimated to be infected with the virus in the past week, Britain's official statistics shows.
So what do we know about this new Covid variant and how infectious is it? Let's talk about it in details. What is XE variant? XE is combination or recombinant of both sub-variants (BA.1 and BA.2) of Omicron.
The recombinant variant appears to be, as per the WHO, 10 per cent more transmissible than the BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron. "Early-day estimates indicate a community growth rate advantage of 10 percent as compared to BA.2, however, this finding requires further confirmation," says the WHO.
A UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) study recently revealed that currently as many are 3 hybrid COVID variants are circulating.