A South African study showed that the risk of hospitalization and severe illness in people infected with the Omicron variant's Covid-19 variant was lower compared to the Delta variant.
But the study authors said one of the chances was low risk of that due to high population immunity.
The question of how ferocious the Omicron variant is at the heart of scientific and political debate in many countries, as a number of governments grapple to find ways to respond to the spread of that variant while researchers race to understand it.
The peer-reviewed study found that people diagnosed with Omicron in South Africa between October 1 and November 30 were 80 percent less likely to be hospitalized than those diagnosed with other variants in the same period.
Among patients treated in that period, those with Omicron had the same chance of becoming seriously ill as those with other variants.
However, the study found that people hospitalized with Omicron in October-November were 70 percent less likely to become seriously ill than those admitted to Delta between April and November.
"Interestingly, our data actually show a positive story about the decrease in Omicron severity compared to other variants," said Professor Cheryl Cohen, one of the study's authors, from the National Institute for Infectious Diseases (NICD).