CDC Drastically Walks Back Estimate Of How Widespread Omicron Variant Was In U.S. Before Christmas
Despite sparking widespread concern across the world, it appears that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) overestimated the earlier spread of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 in the United States by more than 200%.
On December 20, the CDC reported that the vast majority (73%) of COVID-19 cases in the United States were Omicron cases, which was up by 0.7% compared to the previous two weeks. But the CDC has now walked back this number to 22.5%, not 73%.
“The rapidly spreading omicron variant is now the dominant Covid strain in the U.S., representing 73% of sequenced cases, according to data published Monday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,” CNBC reported on December 20. “Omicron has displaced the previously dominant delta variant, which the CDC says is now an estimated 26.6% of sequenced cases for the week ending December 18. Just one week earlier, delta made up 87% of cases to omicron’s 12.6%, the data shows.”
However, the CDC “significantly revised downward the estimate of the percentage of new COVID-19 infections in the U.S. caused by the omicron variant of the virus,” The Hill reported. As of Christmas, the CDC estimated that the number of new coronavirus cases attributable to Omicron was 58%.
“There was a wide predictive interval posted in last week’s chart, in part because of the speed at which Omicron was increasing,” a CDC spokesperson told POLITICO. “We had more data come in from that timeframe and there was a reduced proportion of Omicron.” – READ MORE
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