MOSCOW, December 21. /TASS/. The Omicron variant of coronavirus infects mice and rats, which other variants of COVID-19 strains didn’t do, Head of the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing Anna Popova said on Tuesday.
"At present, the result of our studies reveals the Omicron strain infects mice and rats. We did not observe this pattern in the previous types of strains, we used to search for animal models since mice and rats were insensitive. Today, we see that they [rodents] get infected and develop the disease," she said at a meeting of the state coordination council on fighting the coronavirus infection.
On November 26, the World Health Organization (WHO) designated B.1.1.529 as a "Variant of Concern" and assigned it the Greek letter Omicron. To date, the Omicron strain has been registered in almost 80 countries worldwide. Experts believe that the new Omicron coronavirus strain poses a threat, since it spreads faster and is more contagious than other variants of COVID-19 strains discovered by scientists amid the pandemic, and contains a high number of mutations.