Australia's top health official is "cautiously optimistic" about Omicron, with early signs suggesting it could be less severe than other strains.
Omicron was hardly a twinkle in the World Health Organization's (WHO's) eye until last month, when it was detected in South Africa and subsequently became the country's most dominant strain of the coronavirus.
The highly transmissible new COVID-19 variant is ravaging southern Africa and has been spreading around the world. While no Omicron cases have yet been detected in New Zealand, 10 have been reported in Australia - nine in New South Wales and one in the Northern Territory.
But the infections so far have given Australian health minister Greg Hunt and the federal government reason for optimism.
Despite stressing it was still too early to say definitely, Hunt told 7 News' Sunrise that the latest advice on Omicron showed while it "may be more transmissible", vaccines are still likely to be effective in preventing spread and infection "could be milder".
"At this stage on the Australian cases, we haven't seen anything other than asymptomatic or very mild," he said on Friday morning.
Hunt said Chief Health Officer Professor Paul Kelly - the country's top health official - is "cautiously optimistic" that Omicron won't be a COVID-19 variant that puts strain on Australia's health system.
"Often with disease the course of direction is they become perhaps more transmissible but milder or less severe. Now, if that’s the case then that might be a positive direction," he said.
"But it is too early, which is why we've taken precautions."
It comes after University of Melbourne Professor Tony Blakely described Omicron as a potential "blessing", as initial reports suggest it is less severe than Delta despite being more infectious.
Its apparent high transmissibility could lead it to displace Delta, he told Sunrise on Thursday.
"This one should be more mild, but we don't know exactly how much more mild it is, so that means that the hospitalisation rate should, but we are still learning, be less severe," he explained.
"It might be our 'get out of this pandemic' card."
