Professor of medical research leading global genomics surveillance. Director CERI and KRISP, SA and Deputy Director GSU, Sanger Institute, UK. Tweets my own.
Very honoured to have been in the TIME 100 list of Most Influential People in Health. Even happier, that I got a picture with my electric bike as in addition to science and hunting virus, I love cycling and nature.
#TIME100Health
Exciting News!
@TIME
's 2024
#TIME100Health
list is out! Proud to announce Prof.
@Tuliodna
's selection! His second recognition underscores his ongoing impact in global health. Check out the full list at
Busy day on B.1.1.529 - a variant of great concern - The world should provide support to South Africa and Africa and not discriminate or isolate it! By protecting and supporting it, we will protect the world! A plea for billionaires and financial institutions. 1/8 tweets
Today, I spent a big part of my day talking to genomic and biotech companies as soon we will run out of reagents as airplanes are not flying to South Africa! It will be 'evil' if we can not answer the questions that the world needs about
#Omicron
due to the travel ban!
I do hope it is time to take a global approach for a global pandemic and stop the nationalism and hatred. It is not the scientists or nations fault if viruses move from animals to humans or if they evolve. Global solidarity for a global problem.
I have no idea why people can not realize why pathogen outbreaks are happening more often: 1 - climate change and destruction of environment, 2 - globalization and movement of people, animals and goods, 3 - Weak public health response networks. In one word = human selfishness.
This new variant, B.1.1.529 seems to spread very quick! In less than 2 weeks now dominates all infections following a devastating Delta wave in South Africa (Blue new variant, now at 75% of last genomes and soon to reach 100%)
After years of constructions & one of the biggest investment in scientific infrastructure in SA (ZAR 1.5 billion), we finally open the largest genomics facility in Africa! Together with collaborators, we will advance genomics in Africa to the next level!
#Science
#Africa
Summary of BA.4 & BA.5 in South Africa
- 100% of infections
- Fuelling 5th wave
- Low testing & high positivity ratio
- Increasing number of hospitalizations, however still much lower than in previous waves
- SA may guide the world on the future of the pandemic
I also want to plea to financial organizations
@WorldBank
@IMFNews
@USAID
@PEPFAR
@GlobalFund
to support the poor population and governments in South Africa and Africa to control and extinguish variants! By protecting its poor and oppressed population we will protect the world.
South African scientific dream team, again, helping the world with new knowledge to guide the fight to the pandemic!
Unvaccinated + Omicron = Immunity to Omicron only
Vaccinated + Omicron = Immunity to Omicron and other variants!
This new variant is really worrisome at the mutational level. South Africa and Africa will need support (financially, public health, scientific) to control it so it does not spread in the world. Our poor and deprived population can not be in lockdown without financial support.
We are working around the clock to understand effects on 1) Transmissibility, 2) vaccines, 3) Re-infection, disease severity, and diagnostics. We do have funding for science, but South Africa and Africa need financial help to support their deprived population and health system.
Summary of what we know about Omicron BA.4 & BA.5:
- Suggesting a discrete reservoir, such as chronic human infections and/or animal reservoirs
- BA.4 and BA.5 have a growth advantage over BA.2
- Escape BA.1 infection & potential new wave
Omicron detected in the USA a week before South Africa? However, a report from US CDC on wastewatter was only released today (2 months late). The US CDC is welcome to come to SA for training & capacity building on rapid and accurate genomics surveillance.
We have been very transparent with scientific information. We identified, made data public, and raised the alarm as the infections are just increasing. We did this to protect our country and the world in spite of potentially suffering massive discrimination.
New Omicron BA.4 & BA.5 detected in South Africa, Botswana, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, and U.K. Early indications that these new sublineages are increasing as a share of genomically confirmed cases in SA. No cause for alarm as no major spike in cases, admissions or deaths in SA
Because this variant (B.1.1.529) can be detected by a normal qPCR due to deletion at Spike position 69-70 (like Alpha), it will make it easy for the world to track it. We estimate that 90% of the cases in Gauteng (at least 1000 a day are this variant, due to qPCR proxy testing)
If the world keeps punishing Africa for the discovery of
#Omicron
and 'Global Health Scientists' keep taking the data, who will share early data again? Just saying thanks and keep hoarding of vaccine, antiviral, diagnostics, PPEs, funding, etc - Thread on unfair practices 1/4
Clear signs of 5th wave in SA, the positivity ratio is as high as the previous 4 waves! Please take care and do not be fooled that a new variant is needed to cause a new wave, Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 are antigenic distinct from BA.1 as other variants were from each other.
#COVID19
UPDATE: 27,424 tests were conducted in the last 24hrs, with 8,524 new cases, which represents a 31.1% positivity rate. Today
@HealthZA
reports 11 deaths; of which 5 occurred in the past 24–48 hrs. Total fatalities are 100,516 to date:
We are all tired of this virus, but he may not be tired of us. We need now to take seriously the decreasing immunity from previous infections and
@sigallab
show that vaccination is much more reliable to maintain immunity than only infection.
I would like to ask one to be careful on not interpretation of Gauteng data from middle December. The reason is that Gauteng get quite empty and 100,000s of migrant workers and holiday makers leave. Tip, get a look at Beta wave at similar time last year in Gauteng
Release of 8 new genomes of a new lineage of SARS-CoV-2 with > 100 mutations from South Africa. This is probably the most divergence lineage identified this year. In this thread, we highlight some of the characteristics of the new BA.2.X lineage and epidemiology in SA.
Racism & discrimination is getting out of hand (La Tribuna, Spain). Specially as over 80% of the initial COVID intro in South Africa came from Europe - Tegally et al Nature Medicine 2021. Is not time to stop the discrimination and face this global epidemic together?
Finally out! Our article on the rapid epidemic expansion of
#Omicron
in southern Africa. Here, we describe the discovery of
#Omicron
, its origins, evolutionary history, and growth advantage. Article available at:
I traveled to > 100 countries. Amazing places and amazing people. But I have not seen diversity and nature like South Africa. Maybe bias to have been happy here, maybe due to two oceans (Indic and Atlantic), maybe ecosystem & biodiversity. It should be on everyone's buck list...
Today, new results from our friend
@sigallab
show that previous infections with Omicron BA.1 will not be sufficient to prevent a second infection with BA.4 and BA.5. This confirm our epi and Evo results suggesting that South Africa may start a new wave of infections with BA.4 & 5
With all of due respect, there is absolute NO CONCERN of Omicron EG.5 in South Africa or most of the world. It would be a good idea if people STOP to spread alarm when a lineage of Omicron emerge or giving SILLY NAMES, this one is called 'Eris' by a single scientist, that has no…
Joke of the day number 2: Germany minister do not trust South Africa genomic data. I am sorry if we can produce quicker and higher quality data than your country, so better not to trust as how could SA ever produce good data? Does this sound colonialist thinking?
We thank the U.K. for stopping the red list & travel ban. But the correct action would be to cover the costs of the damages to our economy imposed by the travel blockage. The world need an arbitration system to deal with unfair actions that go against scientific transparency.
Argentina health department confirmed the ‘unknown pathogen’ of the pneumonia cases as Legionela pneumonia bacteria today. Fast action and transparency to fight outbreaks. Genomes should follow in the next few days 🇦🇷
Apologies if I sound harsh in my comment about H5N1 public genomic data. It is such an important global question and now it is weeks and weeks of mention of widespread cases in mammals in the USA and data not public. Public data is the cornerstone of public health response.
Really unscientific decision on keeping South Africa on the red list of travel from the U.K. Fact 1 - SA is one of the most vaccinated countries in Africa. Fact 2 - SA has advanced genomics surveillance (more advanced than many of the countries not on the red list) 1/5 tweets
Science talks: Europe was responsible for over 80% of the early introductions of COVID-19 in South Africa. Results published at Nature Medicine 2021 (Respected Journal with high impact factor) - Why discriminate Africa now?
Pre-print Out - Continued Emergence and Evolution of Omicron in South Africa: New BA.4 & BA.5 lineages - - In this thread, we explain the origin, evolution, and epidemiology of the new Omicron lineages causing the increase of infections in SA.
Swiss health minister Alain Berset said it “no longer made sense to maintain quarantine for people coming from Southern African countries where this variant is circulating because it’s also circulating here.” - Some sense coming from the pragmatic Swiss -
Absolute nonsense
@sajidjavid
! Not only South Africa identified the
#omicron
and alerted the
@WHO
and the world. But we also helped the U.K to identify the the Alpha variant, see Sir
@JeremyFarrar
spike book. U.K. should be rewarding SA for scientific quality and transparency...
The best example of how to screw the pandemic response came from USA. Amazing that the ‘self entitled most advanced’ country on earth has close to 900,000 infections a day, full hospitals, high number of deaths and still an anti vaccine movement in 2022 during the omicron wave…
Finally, millions of doses of vaccines are arriving in South Africa from the USA. Now South Africa can vaccinate 1 million people every 3-4 days. Light in the end of the tunnel for this awful COVID pandemic.
After hoarding vaccines, punishing Africa for identifying variants, the European Union refuses to lift patent protections on Covid-19 vaccines! At the same time, they say Merci, Danke, Gracias & Thanks for your 'great scientific support to the world'... Hypocrisy at the best!
So, it looks that
#COVID19
may be evolving differently and that we may not need a new variant to cause a new wave of infection. We are seeing this with BA.4 and 5 in SA and with BA.2.12.1 on the east coast of the USA.
On the non discrimination & support for Africa financially on my tweets I do mention that we do NOT need extra funding to our science but to support poor people & health care system as they are the ones that suffer the most when loose jobs from travel bans or have to isolate!
Omicron, BA.1, and BA.2 - We need to follow them closely. One has an S-gene drop out the other not. Genomics surveillance and qPCR are essential to control it as it spreads widelyl.
Not the kind of thing that I would Tweet about.
But just listed by
#TIME
as one of the 100 most influential people. However, this was together with Dr. Sikhulile Moyo, a past Ph.D. student, who become a scientific leader, this I am really proud of!
WHO says the new Omicron subvariant BA.2 is not more severe:
- There’s no evidence of a difference in severity between BA.2 & BA.1 (both are Omicron!)
- BA.2 is more transmissible than BA.1 but the gap is smaller than between Omicron and Delta.
- Vaccines are equally effective
BA.4 & BA.5 Recent Developments:
- Wave of infections in SA has peaked with, so far, low hospitalizations & deaths
- Rapid increase of infections in Portugal, with older & highly vaccinated population
- Resurgence in both countries without BA.2 wave
- ECDC listed as VOCs
As scientists working in infectious diseases, the first thing that we do when a virus reemerges is to read the scientific literature. Ten MonkeyPox scientific publications that I read yesterday, thanks
@rjlessells
for the list!
Fine et al. 1998
New Pre-Print from SA: A young female with advanced HIV persistently infected with SARS-CoV-2 for 9 mts, virus accumulating >20 additional mutations. ART suppressed HIV & SARS-CoV-2. Increased vigilance is needed to benefit individuals & prevent variants
Hot of the press: Covid-19 variants names by
@WHO
- 501Y.V1 (B.1.1.7) is now called Alpha,
- 501Y.V2 (B.1.351) is Beta,
- 501Y.V3 (P1) is Gamma,
B.1.671.2, the variant identified in India, is Delta.
Can we stop calling variants by the countries that discover them?
As some countries close their border to us in SA🇿🇦, we open our hearts and our facilities to train African scientists to respond to the pandemic. In the next tweets, I introduce seven fellows that are currently being trained in our genomic labs in South Africa... Tweet 1/8
I agree with our minister Naledi Pandor on removing South Africa from the UK travel red list! Both country's pandemics are driven by the Delta variant (> 98% of infections) and the UK has a higher infection rate! This is looking like racism without a scientific basis.
Such hypocrisy! Liz Truss, the foreign secretary as discovered omicron is transmitting in the UK 'it is important to make sure that we keep travel routes open, particularly to make sure that our economy remains strong.' Seriously? Your ban Africa and want to keep your open???
The
#omicron
has been detected in 60 countries in the world. Many of the countries show higher daily cases than South Africa and many show signs of increasing infections (e.g. U.K. estimates that
#omicron
cases are doubling every 2-3 days). Thread on the over 1000 genomes
@GISAID
Finally out.
@nature
- Peer reviewed manuscript that describes the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2. Amazing team effort that inverts the way in with science is done! First public health response and only after publication!
We told you so! Travel ban to Southern Africa did not stop
#OmicronVirus
! We hope the world reflect on their actions and start learning that scientific transparency should be rewarded and not published.
At least the early warning is saving many precious lives.
Finally out after peer-review
@NatureMedicine
:
Emergence of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron lineages BA.4 and BA.5 in South Africa. In this publication, we describe the origins, evolution and impact of BA.4 & BA.5, which emerged in SA and now dominate most of the global COVID infections. 1/x
Just out in the top British Medical Journal - How the UK's travel ban on South Africa will not be effective to decrease transmission of
#Omicron
, will damage the economy in Africa and may decrease the transparency of scientists & countries in the world!
Please no panic. The B.1.640 and .2 were initially flagged in Oct last year and discussed at
@WHO
, before
#Omicron
. There are only 400 genomes of this lineage, whereas >120,000 of
#Omicron
and the B.1.640.X has not over-competed Delta anywhere
@DrEricDing
please check some data!
Two weeks ago we were in 200-300 cases a day, a week ago in the 1000s and now > 15,000. In addition 1 of 4 tests are positive in South Africa. Amazing increasing of
#OmicronVarient
#COVID19
UPDATE: A total of 65,990 tests were conducted in the last 24hrs, with 16,055 new cases, which represents a 24.3% positivity rate. A further 25
#COVID19
related deaths have been reported, bringing total fatalities to 89,994 to date. See more here:
I do love football but does make me sick to see a full stadium in England tonight with no social distancing or masks and we suffering in Africa and the lack of vaccines as they keep them to themselves so they can enjoy going to the stadium...
I am agreeing with my good friend
@christian_happi
! We, Africa, should have put the U.K. on red list months ago! They had >40,000 cases a day and today the UK put
#Nigeria
on the red list for 27 cases of
#Omicron
! is that global or colonialism and racist Britain?
I will not accept charted planes with reagents as the Travel ban is so damaging to our economy. There are more effective ways to avoid introductions of variants (such as pre-and post- arrival tests, vaccinations, self- or forced- isolation) than blanked travel bans...
Today, I spent a big part of my day talking to genomic and biotech companies as soon we will run out of reagents as airplanes are not flying to South Africa! It will be 'evil' if we can not answer the questions that the world needs about
#Omicron
due to the travel ban!
I just got one of the biggest awards of my career, the Order of Merit of Portugal. I was lucky enough to receive the medal in person from the President of Portugal in his recent visit to SA. I am deeply honored and humbled to have been selected for this wonderful award -…
Such non-sense from the U.K. talking that the main problem is hesitancy in Africa. They had hoarded vaccines for 1 and 1/2 years and now want to blame in hesitancy? Why hesitancy in Africa? Because they do not trust the north and developed countries... Maybe a trust problem?
A thread on
#Omicron
sub-lineages BA.1, BA.1.1, BA.2, and BA.3. Here, we go back to original papers and highlight what we currently know about them in the geographic location where Omicron emerged and caused the first large wave of infections in the world.
We are finishing and releasing a paper showing that Delta completely replace Beta in SA and potentially in all of Africa. We look forward to engaging the UK scientists and for constructive discussion with UK as we both fight the pandemic. All SA data is public at GISAID.
The red list, which covers over 50 countries, is in place to protect public health in the UK. We do not want current travel restrictions to be in place any longer than necessary and recognise the disruption they cause and the impact on people’s lives.
I think that the correct action would be to have a global fund that paid for the lost revenue to countries that are transparent and honest about their variants and epidemics. Tourism in South Africa is very important as provide much needed jobs and protect the environment.
Excellent interview
@GilliSaunders
on the effect of 🇬🇧 travel ban on the 🇿🇦 tourism industry. Absolutely devastating!
R82 billion annually (R225m/day) at risk >1 million jobs if include allied industries. Too many livelihoods already lost 😢
@satsa_sa
From the South African scientific dream team: Just out
@Nature
- T cell responses to SARS-CoV-2 spike cross-recognize Omicron. Absolute amazing work from dozens of scientists in SA to understand how T-cell respond to Omicron, led by
@virusmonologues
@DrEricDing
, can you please keep to facts? At present, there is no evidence that C.1.2 is more transmissible than Delta. On neutralization, we are generating the results now and can work with international agencies & scientific groups that helped with previous variant, Beta.
🦠NEW VARIANT—a new
#SARSCoV2
variant C.1.2 just identified in South Africa & several countries, with concerns it could be more infectious and evade vaccines.
#C12
also has mutation rate that is nearly **twice as fast** as the rate of the other variants.🧵
Dear
@DrEricDing
, when will you realize that we do not need donations or handouts but to be respected as scientists and world citizens? Such a colonial mentality!
Crazy that 'Global health scientists' taking
#Omicron
data & writing papers on their own! How to encourage early sharing of data? Name & shame??? What about 'Name & Fame???'. We would like in the next tweets to name scientists that offered a helping hand 1/3
This is amazing, rock solid science by some of the best scientists on Earth and published in one of the best scientific peer reviewed journals! Hope this is the last nail on the conspiracy theory of the origin of COVID.
A small thread on:
1) Why we are alerted but not too concerned of the global effects of the massive wave of COVID-19 in China,
2) Why the proposed restrictions from Italy & USA are not likely to be effective.
3) Some simple global interventions for 2023.
To anyone pointing to South Africa to suggest the impact of the omicron wave has been 'mild' or that the BA.4/5 haven't had much impact, I'd urge you to look at excess deaths. 29,500 excess deaths since Jan (omicron wave) & a peak of 1,844 excess deaths/wk during BA.4/5 wave.🧵
Saturday: hiking on mountains,
Playing with children, siesta and Thai food. Need to balance life and work so have energy to answer
#Omicron
key scientific scientific questions
Congratulations to
@Tuliodna
and
@kallmemeg
for their extraordinary efforts during the pandemic, named today as
@Nature
's 10, among 10 people who helped shape science for 2021
@DrEricDing
, you may have the wrong info or be confused. Firstly, SA does not have a new CDC, secondly, our current infection is low especially in kids. Thirdly, we have a very efficient scientific community, so may be better to retweet our results and data than create it...
📊SEVERITY IN KIDS—To debunk/educate those asking if
#Omicron
is more severe versus Delta in kids relative to adults—let’s look at new official 🇿🇦CDC’s data—➡️case-hospitalization rate is HIGHER now in kids vs Delta, & higher than adults! (Look at chart below—even risk adjusted).
Thanks
@ThuliMadonsela3
these three women scientists work day and night to genotype and characterize variants! They also make me proud! When they met you they were training 17 African countries on genomics surveillance.
The cherry on top after my brief motivational talk to Africa’s bright minds being trained in
#genomics
at
@STIAS_SA
on November 11, was chatting and posing for pictures with the women scientists at the cutting age of South Africa’s genome sequencing revolution.
South Africa decreases restrictions in spite of
#Omicron
dominating all of the infections. This action is puzzling to the world. Here are a few thoughts on why the government in SA may be correct by acting in this way... Tweets 1/8
The growth advantage of Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 over BA.2 and BA.1 is 0.08 and 0.12 per day
@C_Althaus
and a little bit higher by
@TWenseleers
(whom I would like to apologize for criticizing Twitter & hope he can work with us to better characterize new SA lineages).
@Dr_D_Robertson
Nope, I will not accept reagents without releasing the travel ban! Your secretary of state said today that in spite of local transmission she would not close their airspace of the border as she needs to protect the U.K. economy... We need to realize that this is a global pandemic
O desprezo pela Ciência no Brasil chegou ao pior patamar da década. Menos do que um terço do financiamento de 2015! Uma história muito triste, o Brasil produz cientistas de qualidade global que não terão condições de trabalho para ficar no Brasil e ocorrerá fugas de cérebros. 1/4
The African Scientific Dream Team strikes again! Today a scientific report in Science, revealed that a large consortium of over 300 African scientists and public health institutions illustrated how the SARS-CoV-2 variants reached and spread across Africa.
Good news on COVID-19 variants. The current sub-lineages BQ.1s & XBBs are not causing a deadly wave of infections in world. In South Africa, which many times see things early in Omicron evolution BQ1s & XBB low prevalence & no cause for great concern.
Arrived to a great surprise! 6 great bottles of wines and a message 'Here is something special and to say "Thank you" for your science-leadership' This will keep me going with a smile 😁🥰🤩
Dengue outbreaks can affect 390 million persons yearly. In a trial involving 16,235 persons in Brazil, the live, attenuated, tetravalent Butantan vaccine was efficacious in all age groups at 2 years. Read the full trial results:
Mask mandates ending in South Africa. Despite all our difficulties, we managed well the 4th wave (Omicron BA.1) & 5th wave (Omicron BA.4/5). Time to have a break from mask-wearing. Hope we are not the ones to identify the new variant & get this pandemic behind us once & for all
I am so glad that our scientific interactions with the UK worked well and that South Africa and most of Africa is out of the travel red list! Important now to keep focused to control the pandemic, increase vaccination and strength genomics surveillance in Africa.
SARS-CoV-2 variants over time in South Africa - Beta has not been detected for months, Delta, the same as the U.K. and everywhere in the world, dominates >99%. C.1.2 has been 'extinguished. Variants are not related to the science related to the travel ban from the U.K.
Wounderful day! After a tour of our new state-of-the-art genomics facility at
@ceri_news
@StellenboschUni
I could have 10 minutes to have a chat with our president Ramaphosa
@PresidencyZA
Such a luck day, after showing
@DrTedros
from
@WHO
our genomics facilities, we could have a quiet break and a nice chat about helping the world to fight epidemics
Can you believe that Africa is leading cutting edge research on COVID?
Yes, I can, if you see the hard work & passion of our scientists! A star rising: Sandile Cele, a PhD student from KwaZulu-Natal that spent all his 'holidays' in a P3+ lab
We just submitted a pre-print 'A novel variant of interest (VOI) of SARS-CoV-2 with multiple spike mutations detected through travel surveillance in Africa.'
This VOI has 31 amino acids mutations. In Spike has 11 mutations and three deletions in the N-terminal domain
Less than 5% of vaccines committed at G7 were delivered by COVAX. The UK & Canada 'delivered ZERO (0%)', in addition, are hoarding vaccines. The only shining lights are Japan & US. Unethical and Criminal nationalism and protectionism in action. Shame on you 'developed countries'
This expert must be confusing me with someone else, I was the one that raised the alarm on Omicron and got it recognized as a Variant of Concern by the WHO and the world, never mentioned in any of our scientific and peer review results that Omicron was mild. But still stand by…
5) This tweet by Tulio (aka “Omicron is mild” evangelist who then sat and witnessed Omicron take over the world causing havoc)… will likely also age poorly. I can’t understand why someone would dare say “there is absolute NO CONCERN” when there is clearly a LOT of concern.
One of my heroes is my sister! She spent years & most financial reserves of her human rights law firm to convict ex-catholic priest & pedophile In East Timor. She got death threats but defended orphans that were sexually abused, today she won the case!