UK posts initial COVID-19 BA.2.86 risk assessment Officials say the rapid appearance in multiple countries in people without travel histories suggests established international spread. CIDRAP

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The newly identified variant has many genetic mutations and is distant from BA.2, its likely ancestor, and currently circulating XBB variants. The similarity of the sequences so far—six samples from four countries—suggests relatively recent emergence and rapid growth, but the HSA said it has low confidence in that assessment, pending the examination of further sequences.

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‘Eris’ COVID strain leaves vaccine strategy mostly unchanged Welcome to The Hill’s Health Care newsletter{beacon} Health Care Health Care   The Big Story ‘Eris’ strain leaves vaccine strategy mostly unchanged The updated COVID-19… emartin The Hill

The updated COVID-19 booster shots were designed to target the XBB variant, and they’ll still likely work just as well against the new dominant strain.

Bivalent COVID vaccine boosts protection against emergency, urgent care in young kids Quinn Dombrowski / Flickr cc CIDRAP

A dose of bivalent (two-strain) mRNA COVID-19 vaccine booster pushed effectiveness against emergency or urgent care (ED/UC) to 80% among preschool children, compared with 46% after two Moderna monovalent (single-strain) doses and 70% after three monovalent Pfizer/BioNTech doses.

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