Australian officials are not worried after a new COVID-19 arrived in the state of Victoria.
Victorian health officials said they are monitoring the detection of a new Omicron sub-variant found in wastewater samples from the suburb of Tullamarine in Melbourne.
Officials said the sub-variant is either BA.4 or BA.5 which has been detected in a small number of cases in South Africa, Botswana, Belgium, Denmark, the United Kingdom and Germany.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) said less than 200 sequences of the new stains had been collected.
WHO epidemiologists said there are currently no known significant differences between the new strain and the BA.2 strain, which is the dominant strain of COVID-19 in New Zealand.
Victorian Chief Health Officer Professor Brett Sutton said he isn't worried about the new strain infecting more Australians.
"Not surprised. But not worried," Prof Sutton tweeted. "The point with all the newly emergent lineages is that when they out-compete existing variants, we get upward pressure on cases and more risk of getting infected. So get up-to-date with vaccines; wear a quality mask indoors & test when required."
The Victorian Health Department said there 66.9 percent of Victorians aged 18 and over have had three doses of the COVID vaccine and 94.5 percent aged 12 and over have had two doses.
According to world data, there were 46,499 new COVID cases across Australia reported on Thursday.
