11-03-22 BQ variants represented a third of reported New York cases as of Monday—and 15% of cases in California, according to data from GISAID. BQ.1.1’s extreme immune evasiveness and transmissibility “sets it up to be the principal driver of the next U.S. wave in the weeks ahead. Scientists won’t know to what extent BQ.1.1 evades vaccines, if it does, until it reaches 30% to 50% of cases somewhere. BQ.1.1 is already known to escape antibody immunity, rendering useless some of the key treatments used in high-risk individuals with COVID. The good news, if there is any, about BQ is that new Omicron boosters will “almost certainly” provide “some” protection against them because they were designed to tackle close relative BA.5.

11-16 Moderna said that its bivalent boosters have demonstrated neutralizing activity against BQ.1.1 in research assays from 40 participants “despite an approximately fivefold drop in titers compared to BA.4/BA.5.” In the New York region, which includes New Jersey, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 accounted for 59.9% of new cases, well ahead of BA.5, which accounted for 19.5% of new cases. The World Health Organization has said that based on current data, BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 appear to be more infectious than previous variants but are no more likely to cause serious illness or death.