The recently detected BA.2.86 COVID-19 subvariant may be more capable of causing infections in people who previously contracted the virus or have been vaccinated, according to a risk assessment from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), though it remains unclear if this strain causes more severe illness than others. First detected last month, a handful of infections caused by BA.2.86 have been reported in the U.S., Denmark, South Africa, the U.K. and Israel. The CDC noted that genomic sequencing of COVID-19 has dropped “substantially” when compared to the past few years, so the spread and occurrence of new...