If the variant pushes hospitals over the brink it will be catastrophic. Peru had very bad outcomes because they ran out of oxygen. Many otherwise healthy patients died who would have likely survived had they had some O2.

We forget how good Western medicine is, but none of that is going to matter if the system is overwhelmed and god forbid we run out of O2.

Also I imagine most patients right now being hospitalized in South Africa have Omicron.