{"id":132721,"date":"2021-12-19T16:23:31","date_gmt":"2021-12-20T00:23:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/12\/scientists-didnt-see-omicron-coming-and-no-one-knows-whats-next"},"modified":"2021-12-19T16:23:31","modified_gmt":"2021-12-20T00:23:31","slug":"scientists-didnt-see-omicron-coming-and-no-one-knows-whats-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/12\/scientists-didnt-see-omicron-coming-and-no-one-knows-whats-next","title":{"rendered":"Scientists didn\u2019t see omicron coming. And no one knows what\u2019s next"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/scientists-didnt-see-omicron-coming-and-no-one-knows-whats-next2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In spring 2020, shortly after the pandemic began, many scientists predicted that the coronavirus would not evolve particularly fast.<\/p>\n<p>But those predictions have been upended time and again \u2014 and never more so than with omicron, a variant with an astonishing number of mutations that is rampaging through Europe and South Africa. In New York, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/health\/article\/Omicron-variant-in-California-Latest-news-and-16708340.php\">cases are suddenly soaring to record levels<\/a> as holiday parties and sports games are canceled, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/bayarea\/article\/Santa-Clara-County-with-10-cases-of-omicron-16707906.php\">California officials are bracing for a similar crisis<\/a> in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n<p>Once again, uncertainty and worry are rising. No one knows what the next Greek letter variants will unleash.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In spring 2020, shortly after the pandemic began, many scientists predicted that the coronavirus would not evolve particularly fast. But those predictions have been upended time and again \u2014 and never more so than with omicron, a variant with an astonishing number of mutations that is rampaging through Europe and South Africa. In New York, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":614,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-132721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/614"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132721\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}