Donald Yergeau, left, associate director of genomic technologies at the University at Buffalo Genomics and Bioinformatics Core, and Jennifer Surtees, co-director of the UB Genome, Environment and Microbiome Center (GEM), lead the team that determines which coronavirus variants are circulating in Western New York.
By Scott Scanlon and Stephen T. Watson
News Staff Reporters
The Delta variant continues to fuel rising Covid-19 case numbers across the Northeast, including Western New York. But the biochemist who leads efforts to track variants of concern in the region expects Omicron will arrive in force during the coming weeks.
The temporary vaccination sites offered locally were among more than 40 across the state announced Saturday morning by Gov. Kathy Hochul scheduled to begin right away and operate in the weeks to come.
Jennifer Surtees, associate professor of microbiology at the Jacobs School of Medicine, has a graph showing the evolution of mutations of the SARS-CoV-2 virus since last March in New York State, with specifics to Erie County.
“This is a crisis. This is a health care crisis and people are going to die. If people had gotten vaccinated when we asked them to, and got the booster shots, I wouldn’t have had to put in place a mask mandate," Hochul said.
Donald Yergeau, left, associate director of genomic technologies at the University at Buffalo Genomics and Bioinformatics Core, and Jennifer Surtees, co-director of the UB Genome, Environment and Microbiome Center (GEM), lead the team that determines which coronavirus variants are circulating in Western New York.
Jennifer Surtees, associate professor of microbiology at the Jacobs School of Medicine, has a graph showing the evolution of mutations of the SARS-CoV-2 virus since last March in New York State, with specifics to Erie County.
