South Africa: The first large-scale examination of vaccination effectiveness in the region where the new variant was discovered appears to back up early signs that omicron is more easily transmissible and that the Pfizer injection isn't as successful as it was against the delta form in protecting against infection.

More than 211,000 positive COVID-19 test results were used in the study, with 41 percent coming from people who had received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine. Between November 15 and December 7, omicron infections were reported for almost 78,000 positive COVID-19 test findings.

Discovery Health, South Africa's largest private health insurer, and the South African Medical Research Council collaborated on the research. The research was conducted in the weeks following the discovery of omicron by scientists in South Africa and Botswana in November. The study's conclusions are preliminary and have not been peer reviewed, according to the researchers.

The information is based on the first three weeks of South Africa's omicron-driven wave and is subject to vary over time. The omicron variant has caused a rise in COVID-19 in South Africa for the first time.

According to Johns Hopkins University, the seven-day rolling average of daily new cases in South Africa has increased over the past two weeks, rising from 8.07 new cases per 100,000 people on Nov. 29 to 34.37 new cases per 100,000 people on Dec. 13.

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