BA.4 is here: What does this mean for Alberta’s COVID trajectory? – CBC
Dr. Deena Hinshaw announced Alberta’s first identified case of the Omicron subvariant on Wednesday
May 26, 2022
The Omicron subvariant BA.4 has officially arrived in Alberta, and while doctors and scientists expect it will likely trigger an uptick in cases, it is unclear just how dramatic that surge will be or whether it will put further strain on hospitals.
Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, announced on Wednesday that a single case of the subvariant, which was first identified in South Africa and has since been detected in other countries, has been discovered through ongoing surveillance.
The BA.4 case was found in a sample collected in early May.
“This is not really surprising news,” said Craig Jenne, an associate professor of microbiology, immunology and infectious diseases at the University of Calgary.
“We’ve known that this variant has been circulating for a while now and really with open travel now…the concept of keeping these international and even inter-provincial variants out of Alberta really is not possible.”
