By Justin HAGER

With the arrival of the winter holiday season, the onset of the latest variant of the deadly COVID-19 virus – omicron – could not have come at a worse time. More than 50 million Americans are expected to engage in interstate travel during the winter holidays, including groups like students and seniors who are more likely to live in communal residences, which make the risk of a mass outbreak more likely.

Though a lot about omicron isn’t known yet, according to Don Diamond, Ph.D., a professor in the Dept. of Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation at City of Hope comprehensive care hospital and research center in Los Angeles, what is known points to omicron being the most contagious variant of COVID to be identified.

“Omicron likely arose from a person who was immunocompromised and thus provided the virus with greater opportunities to evolve and develop the more than 50 mutations it now has,” said Dr. Diamond. “There is a sequence of DNA that looks very similar to one of the common cold-viruses; it also appears to have elements of both beta and delta. It is very good at being transmissible, a couple-fold more transmissible than delta, which is a couple of fold more than alpha, which is a couple fold more than the original. The holidays are a huge dilemma because people want to congregate. If one person has the virus, you have to assume that everyone sitting at that holiday table has a good chance of getting it, with outcomes dependent upon the individual.”

Medical experts like Dr. Diamond are also concerned about whether the current vaccines will be as effective against omicron as they are against delta, beta, alpha and the original COVID-19 virus. While being clear that there is still much data specific to omicron that is not known yet, Dr. Diamond explained that current vaccine technology prompts the body to develop neutralizing antibodies, which are like special forces soldiers – potent, but temporary and specialized. A growing body of evidence shows that the current vaccines lose a significant portion of their efficacy after six months because the number of neutralizing antibodies declines and it takes significant time for the body to train more.

To combat this problem, Dr. Diamond is working on a next generation COVID vaccine that would prompt the body to develop T-cells. T-cells are like a standing army or guard that occurs at a lower frequency but are much longer lived.

When the COVID-19 virus first appears in the body the T-cells are already primed, they are already circulating at low levels and once they engage with the virus they send a signal to produce a response immediately, cutting the immune system’s response time from a few weeks down to just a day or two.

Because they are less specialized, the T-cells are also better than neutralizing antibodies at responding to multiple variants, like omicron.

Dr. Diamond’s vaccine is currently undergoing multiple trials, including one that is studying the effects of the vaccine on patients who are immunocompromised due to transplants and another as a one-shot booster for healthy and fit adults. He is also exploring a trial for those patients who are affected by cancer and have a harder time responding to the vaccine.

When asked what preventive measures can be taken to keep safe during the holiday season, he responded, “You have to be anti-social, you have to be vaccinated, you have to be recently boosted and you have to wear a mask indoors [and] outdoors if you want to avoid getting it. It’s a shame, but many things are a shame and we either protect ourselves or we don’t.”