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(Adds WHO comment)
* Drugmaker CEO warns of 'material drop' in effectiveness
* Markets fall on fears of prolonged COVID-19 pandemic
* Partly recover on more upbeat comments from EU officials
* Time needed to know if vaccines work against Omicron
* Japan reports first case as new variant spreads
By Ludwig Burger and Emma Thomasson
FRANKFURT/BERLIN, Nov 30 (Reuters) - The World Health
Organization warned countries on Tuesday not to impose blanket
travel bans over the new Omicron coronavirus variant as
governments and scientists tried to figure how much protection
current vaccines would offer against the strain.
Financial markets fell sharply after the head of drugmaker
Moderna said existing COVID-19 vaccines would be less effective
against the Omicron variant, but they recovered strongly after
more reassuring comments from European officials.
BioNTech's chief executive also struck a cautiously positive
note, saying BioNTech and Pfizer's vaccine was likely to
offer strong protection against severe disease from Omicron.
The WHO said that blanket travel bans would not stop the new
variants spread but would place a "heavy burden" on lives and
livelihoods.
It advised governments to take measures such as screening or
quarantine of international passengers if the evidence warranted
it.
However, people who are unwell or at higher risk of
developing severe COVID-19, including those 60 years or older,
should postpone travel, the WHO said in a statement.
WHO Secretary General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he
understood the concerns about Omicron.
But he added: https://www.reuters.com/world/whos-tedros-warns-against-over-reaction-omicron-2021-11-30
"I am equally concerned that several member states are
introducing blunt, blanket measures that are not evidence-based
or effective on their own, and which will only worsen
inequities."
European Medicines Agency (EMA) executive director Emer
Cooke told the European Parliament that existing vaccines will
continue to provide protection.
Andrea Ammon, chair of the European Centre for Disease
Prevention and Control (ECDC), said the cases of Omicron so far
confirmed in 10 European Union countries were mild or without
symptoms, although in younger age groups.
News of Omicron's emergence wiped roughly $2 trillion off
global stocks on Friday, after it was identified in southern
Africa and announced on Nov. 25.
The Pan-European STOXX 600 index, spooked by fears that
vaccine resistance https://www.reuters.com/world/how-worried-should-we-be-about-omicron-variant-2021-11-27
might trigger restrictions that would choke off a nascent
recovery, was down 0.5% at around 1644 GMT on Tuesday, having
fallen as much as 1.5% in early trade.
In New York at 1605 GMT, the Dow Jones Industrial Average
and the S&P 500 respectively were down about 1.3%
and 1.26%.
"There is no world, I think, where (the effectiveness) is
the same level...we had with Delta," Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel
told the Financial Times https://www.ft.com/content/27def1b9-b9c8-47a5-8e06-72e432e0838f.
"I think it's going to be a material drop. I just don't know
how much because we need to wait for the data. But all the
scientists I've talked to?.?.?.are like, 'this is not going to
be good'."
Reuters could not reach Moderna for comment.
The University of Oxford said there was no evidence that
current vaccines would not prevent severe disease from Omicron https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/how-fast-does-it-spread-scientists-ask-whether-omicron-can-outrun-delta-2021-11-29,
but that it was ready to rapidly update its shot, developed
with AstraZeneca, if necessary.
LAB TESTS
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals said its COVID-19 antibody
cocktail and other similar antiviral treatments could be less
effective against the latest variant.
EMA's Cooke said lab tests for "cross neutralisation" would
take about two weeks. If there were a need to change COVID-19
vaccines, new ones could be approved within three or four
months, she said.
"Vaccination will likely still keep you out of the
hospital," said John Wherry, director of the Penn Institute for
Immunology in Philadelphia.
Moderna and fellow drugmakers BioNTech and Johnson & Johnson
are already working on vaccines that specifically target
Omicron. Moderna has also been testing a higher dose of its
existing booster.
BioNTech Chief Executive Ugur Sahin told Reuters that
BioNTech and Pfizer's vaccine was likely to offer strong
protection against severe disease from the new variant.
Sahin said he expects lab tests to show some loss of
protection against mild and moderate disease due to Omicron but
the extent of that loss was hard to predict.
BORDER CONTROLS
But border closures have already cast a shadow over economic
recovery with parts of Europe now seeing a fourth wave of
infections as winter sets in.
Many of the new travel restrictions have focused, to South
Africa's fury, on banning flights to and from southern Africa.
Japan confirmed its first case of the new variant on
Tuesday, in a traveller from Namibia. Australia found that a
person with Omicron had visited a busy shopping centre in Sydney
while probably infectious.
Britain and the United States have both pushed their booster
programmes in response to the new variant. London said
international arrivals would have to self-isolate until they get
a negative result in a PCR test.
Greece said vaccination would be compulsory for the
over-60s, the group seen as most vulnerable to COVID-19.
Australia on Monday delayed the reopening of its
international borders by two weeks, less than 36 hours before
foreign students and skilled migrants were to be allowed back.
But in Germany, a current hotspot of the previous
significant variant, Delta, the seven-day average infection rate
fell slightly for the first time in three weeks after new
restrictions to slow transmission.
Sources said chancellor-in-waiting Olaf Scholz supported
making vaccination against COVID-19 compulsory and backed
barring the unvaccinated from non-essential stores.
Neighbouring Austria, which imposed its fourth full lockdown
last week after a surge in infections, also registered a drop.
But France registered its highest daily infection tally
since April.
And the Dutch health authority said Omicron was already
spreading in the Netherlands, where intensive care beds are
running out and measures including restrictions on hospitality
have yet to take effect.
The curbs on travellers from southern Africa have
highlighted the inequality of vaccine distribution, which may
have given the virus more opportunities to mutate.
The passenger liner Europa was docking in Cape Town on
Tuesday in what was meant to be the official start of the first
cruise ship season in South Africa's top tourist hub since the
pandemic.
After Omicron was discovered while they were at sea, many
passengers were expected to fly straight home.
(Reporting by Reuters bureaux worldwide; Writing by Himani
Sarkar and Kevin Liffey; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Nick
Macfie, Angus MacSwan and Mark Heinrich)
