Omicron-B.1.1.529 leads to widespread escape from neutralizing antibody responses

Summary
On the 24th November 2021 the sequence of a new SARS CoV-2 viral isolate spreading rapidly in Southern Africa was announced, containing far more mutations in Spike (S) than previously reported variants. Neutralization titres of Omicron by sera from vaccinees and convalescent subjects infected with early pandemic as well as Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta are substantially reduced or fail to neutralize. Titres against Omicron are boosted by third vaccine doses and are high in cases both vaccinated and infected by Delta. Mutations in Omicron knock out or substantially reduce neutralization by most of a large panel of potent monoclonal antibodies and antibodies under commercial development. Omicron S has structural changes from earlier viruses, combining mutations conferring tight binding to ACE2 to unleash evolution driven by immune escape, leading to a large number of mutations in the ACE2 binding site which rebalance receptor affinity to that of early pandemic viruses.
Competing Interest Statement
G.R.S sits on the GSK Vaccines Scientific Advisory Board and is a founder member of RQ Biotechnology. J.Z. and G.S. declare the Israel patent application no. 23/09/2020 277546 and U.S.A patent application no. 16/12/2020 63/125984 entitled Methods and compositions for treating coronaviral infections. Oxford University holds intellectual property related to the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. AJP is Chair of UK Dept. Health and Social Care (DHSC) Joint Committee on Vaccination & Immunisation (JCVI) but does not participate in the JCVI COVID19 committee, and is a member of the WHO SAGE. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent the views of DHSC JCVI or WHO. The University of Oxford has entered into a partnership with AstraZeneca on coronavirus vaccine development. The University of Oxford has protected intellectual property disclosed in this publication. S.C.G. is co-founder of Vaccitech (collaborators in the early development of this vaccine candidate) and is named as an inventor on a patent covering use of ChAdOx1-vectored vaccines and a patent application covering this SARS-CoV-2 vaccine (PCT/GB2012/000467). T.L. is named as an inventor on a patent application covering this SARS-CoV-2 vaccine and was a consultant to Vaccitech for an unrelated project during the conduct of the study. S.J.D. is a Scientific Advisor to the Scottish Parliament on COVID-19.
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