While COVID-19 transmission remains low in the US, health experts are anxious about the potential for a big summer wave as two factors seem set for a collision course: a lull in infection activity that suggests protective responses have likely waned in the population, and a new SARS-CoV-2 variant with an infectious advantage over other variants.
The new variant is dubbed NB.1.8.1. Like all the other currently circulating variants, it’s a descendant of omicron. Specifically, NB.1.8.1 is derived from the recombinant variant XDV.1.5.1. Compared to the reigning omicron variants JN.1 and LP.8.1, the new variant has a few mutations that could help it bind to human cells more easily
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