Health officials say the exhibition of symptoms of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus are less in comparison to other variants.
They claim symptoms such as a mild cough, cold, and a mild sore throat is prevalent in individuals infected with the Omicron variant.
High fever common to other virus variants is not a symptom of the Omicron variant.
Speaking during a media briefing at the Health Promotion Bureau today, Head of the Department of Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Kelaniya, Specialist at the Colombo South Teaching Hospital Dr. Shamila de Silva said individuals infected with Omicron will most likely not exhibit symptoms of fever as opposed to those infected with the Delta variant.
Dr. de Silva said individuals infected with the Omicron variant will have severe headaches and will most likely have a cough and a sore throat.
She said those infected with the Delta variant will indicate more severe symptoms including difficulty in breathing, fever, cough and cold, loss of smell and will lead to pneumonia.
Dr. de Silva said the difference between Omicron and Delta variant is that the symptoms are less severe in Omicron cases.
On a separate note, Dr. de Silva said the main reason for the increase in the number of COVID-infections at present is those who were keen on obtaining the first and second doses of a COVID-19 vaccine are now hesitant to obtain the booster jab.
She said various myths circulating among society was the main reason for the public hesitating to obtain the booster jab.
Dr. de Silva said certain vaccines will boost immunity throughout a person’s life span while certain vaccines only provide short-term immunity requiring booster jabs to be administered from time to time.
She said they receive patients at hospitals complaining of recent back aches, headaches, stomach aches and body aches questioning whether they were side effects of the COVID-vaccine administered to them over four months ago.
She said there are myths circulating amongst youth that the vaccine will cause erectile dysfunction and also disrupt the menstrual cycle adding all such claims are false.
Dr. de Silva however said although the COVID-vaccine does not cause any side effects, contracting the coronavirus can cause impotence, infertility, and blood clots that lead to heart attacks and strokes.
She said contracting the virus will lead to long term side effects.
Dr. de Silva said through post marketing surveillance conducted on large subject groups who received the Pfizer booster dose, it revealed of blood clots in one in a million adding it is an extremely rare occurrence.
She however said blood clots occurring when contracting the virus was a more likely scenario.
