Geoffrey Smith 

Investing.com — U.S. stock markets opened higher on Thursday, as investors tempered their concerns about the new Omicron strain of Covid-19 against the backdrop of another set of healthy labor market data.

Senior citizen Pfizer An executive at (NYSE) stated earlier that the company does not anticipate a significant drop in effectiveness of its vaccine against this new variant. GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE) reported early trials data that its antiviral experimental treatment Sotrovimab was effective against all variants of Omicron. GSK ADRs increased 1.0%, while shares of its research partner Vir Biotechnology NASDAQ: consolidated and have risen 50% over the past week. 

The index was at 9:50 ET (1450 GMT) and had risen 393 points or 1.2% to 34,415. Its cyclical-heavy structure helped it outperform other major indices, after some days of poor performance. The was 1.0% higher than the 0.7%.

The Labor Department reported earlier that last week’s initial unemployment claims rose to 222,000. That number is second in the history of the pandemic and lower than analysts’ predictions for 240,000. Another 5,000 were added to the initial claims for last week.