After noticing various strain mutations, the team flagged the Minister of Health on Monday, Nov. 22. Moyo revealed to NPR, other groups in South Africa were sequencing samples and recognized similarities. After inputting sequences in the public database, South Africa reported to the WHO on Nov. 25.

When Omicron became known to other countries in late November, they took immediate action. The United States, the United Kingdom, and other nations issued travel bans against eight African countries such as South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Mozambique, Malawi, Lesotho, Eswatini, and Botswana.

“We were saddened. For me, personally, I felt that after two years into the epidemic, clearly as the global health community, we could be responding better and coordinating better. How do you reward the countries that alert you of a potential dangerous pathogen with travel bans? My country was put on a red list, and I didn’t feel good about that,” Moyo said to NPR.

Although Moyo and scientists ethically made the right move by coming forward about the new variant, in the same breath, Moyo believes his country is being punished.

“We know the repercussions. Flights were canceled, goods were not coming into the country, a lot of businesses lost millions. And our vaccine supply was being threatened because of delays on the way,” he said. “Quite a trail of destruction. So it was a roller coaster for us. On the one extreme, we felt [we were] contributing to the world in a small way. And on the other end, we felt, is that how you reward scientists or scientific progression?”

Botswana-Harvard AIDS Institute Partnership

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