Assistant director of health Espen Rostrup Nakstad believes that more measures may be needed towards Christmas to control the omicron infection.
–
Rising infection rates, omicron cases and a pressured health service were the reasons when the government introduced measures last week. The new measures include recommendations to keep a distance of one meter, wear a face mask and not have more than ten guests at home.
– This is the recommendation from the government to provide predictability, but there may be sharp advice towards Christmas, Nakstad says to VG on Monday morning.
Nakstad has also been clear to NRK that we can expect more measures.
– My answer is that there will definitely be adjustments in the future, he replied NRK Monday when asked if we can expect stricter measures towards Christmas.
– The government has asked for new advice on an ongoing basis, which we also provide. We can not let omikron lead us into a situation that is even more serious than the one we are in now, Nakstad told the channel.
Can have a “fairly normal” Christmas
Nakstad says that the current measures seem to be good enough to flatten the curve for the delta variant, but that it is not certain that they are good enough in the face of the new mutation.
– Had it not been for omikron, we would have been able to enter a nice winter time with the measures we have today, he says to VG.
Nevertheless, Nakstad thinks we can expect a “fairly normal” Christmas celebration.
– The risk of infection in private Christmas parties is less if the infection pressure is generally lower. We must remember that we have less contact with people than in everyday life at Christmas – we are not as much on buses, trains, events, and activities in everyday life are on break during the Christmas holidays, he says.
– Christmas can be positive to contribute to less spread of infection, but it presupposes that we are healthy when we meet friends and family.
See the full interview with Nakstad:
Still uncertain
When assessing what measures are needed, it is first and foremost important to see if you meet the target groups who have the most infection, according to Nakstad.
– Adjustments mean measuring even better than today, because we do not know the omicron variant, for example which part of the country it dominates first. It may be important to implement the measures there, before it spreads to other parts of the country.
Nakstad points out that it is still uncertain what kind of disease course can be expected with the omicron variant.
– But we know that it is more contagious than delta and look at a recent report from Denmark yesterday that it actually doubles in the number of registered cases of infection every two to three days. Same we’ve seen from the UK. This confirms that this spread can go very fast if we get more outbreaks in Norway, he says.
Previous studies of the vaccines’ effect against the new virus variant show that it can have an effect against both serious illness and spread of infection. Nevertheless, much is still uncertain about the new variant.
– If the effect of the vaccines protects well against serious disease with omicron, it is a great advantage. In that case, that is the difference from March 2020. But we already have quite a few hospitalized – in fact more than in March 2020. This with how well the vaccines protect in practice, how well it prevents you from being admitted to hospital, should we would have liked to have had reliable figures, he says.
–
