The World Health Organization (WHO) recently said that a new COVID-19 variant that emerged earlier this year is now a “variant under monitoring,” becoming the second COVID-19 variant to get that designation in the past month.
The XFG variant, which is one of many offshoots of the JN.1 strain, was evaluated by the WHO to pose a low risk at the global level. Sequences of XFG were first reported in January 2025, according to a recent WHO report.
“Currently approved COVID-19 vaccines are expected to remain effective to this variant against symptomatic and severe disease. Several countries in the South-East Asia Region have reported a simultaneous rise in new cases and hospitalizations, where XFG has been widely detected,” the United Nations’ health body stated in a June 25 report.
It said that recent data do not suggest that the XFG variant can lead to more severe disease or deaths than from other variants that are circulating.
Cases and hospitalizations have been rising in countries where XFG cases are relatively higher, the WHO said, adding that some countries in Southeast Asia have reported more cases and hospital stays connected to the variant.
In the United States, the variant was estimated to make up only 14 percent of cases as of June 21, according to an update issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on June 26.
Overall, XFG appears to show a “moderate” growth advantage because growth sequences for the variant have risen from 7.4 percent in early May to 22.7 percent between late May and early June, according to the WHO report.
XFG seems to have a low risk of immune escape (ability to evade the body’s immune response), although confidence in the assessments is low because of the recent expansion and low levels of sequencing, according to the WHO. Also, only one study has been done to assess antigenicity, which is the ability, or degree of ability, to react with the products of an immune response.
“In India, XFG has been the dominant variant throughout the Spring and NB.1.8.1 remained very rare,” the WHO stated in its update, also suggesting that XFG is not common in Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean regions.
Reported Symptoms
Another COVID-19 variant, NB.1.8.1, is the No. 1 reported variant in the United States, according to the CDC, while the strain is said to have driven cases in mainland China throughout this year.
Like XFG, NB.1.8.1 was deemed a “variant under monitoring” by the WHO in May. International reporting and some doctors in China have said that the NB.1.8.1 variant can feature a sharp, sore throat along with other COVID-19 symptoms such as fever, cough, and aches.
But because of the Chinese Communist Party’s history of covering up information and publishing unreliable data—including underreporting COVID-19 infections and related deaths since 2020—information provided by local doctors and health workers is more valuable for understanding the situation on the ground in the country.
The WHO recently issued an updated report on the origins of COVID-19, saying that its researchers failed to find a definitive answer for how the virus started. U.S. intelligence officials have signaled for years that the virus had probably been leaked from a laboratory near Wuhan, China, in late 2019 before spreading across China and then the world.
The WHO update also comes several weeks after the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recommended that healthy children and pregnant women be removed from the CDC’s recommended immunization schedule for COVID-19.
And recently, the Food and Drug Administration expanded warnings for mRNA COVID-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer and Moderna regarding the potential risks of two types of heart infections: myocarditis and pericarditis.
The Epoch Times contacted the CDC on June 30 for comment on the variants.