New COVID variant causing itchy, watery eyes
FOX 5 NY’s Sharon Crowley spoke to medical experts about how concerned you should be.
There's a new Coronavirus variant that is under investigation by the World Health Organization.
"It's not time for panic, it's not time for widespread alarm, but it's certainly something that we need to keep an eye on," said Doctor Chid Iloabachie, associate chair of emergency medicine at Long Island Jewish Valley Stream hospital.
Doctors here in New York City and around the world are looking into the new Omicron subvariant, Arcturus, that's spreading fast.
Doctor Rabia Delatour at New York University Langone said "concerning is that the fact that it may be resistant in terms of antibodies, we may have form to the other omicron sub variant, so this specific strain may be able to evade those antibodies that our body may have form to the other omicron sub variants."
This new Covid-19 threat is an Omicron subvariant called Arcturus. Its highly contagious among children in India and it's causing a new symptom.
Doctor Delatour said "something unique about this strain is that we're seeing a lot more cases in children in India, and those children are experiencing some severe conjunctivitis, which is redness or irritation of the eyes and this wasn't previously seen with other immigrants of variants, so it’s something unique to this strain."
Even with Covid-fatigue, health care professionals say people still need to pay attention to what may be the next dominant Coronavirus variant here in the United States.
Doctor Iloabachie said "I would encourage anyone who has not been up-to-date in their boosting to get a booster as soon as they can."
The public health measures that we've always been taking still work against this new variant that includes frequent handwashing and hand sanitization that includes wearing a mask when you're in crowded places." Sharon Crowley Fox Five news.