The move is part of a plan to be announced on Thursday, according to a person familiar with the decision. Nearly two dozen countries, including the U.S., have now detected the variant.
The European Union, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Israel have announced travel restrictions from southern African countries as well.
Some health officials and public health experts caution that travel restrictions alone may not be effective in controlling the spread of infectious disease, and could even have harmful effects, like exacerbating xenophobia and deterring countries from being transparent about the state of the virus in the future.
The variant was first reported last week in South Africa, where vaccination rates are about 24%.
Cases of the omicron variant have since been confirmed in Botswana, the United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Belgium, Israel, the Netherlands, Australia, and Hong Kong.
Biden is encouraging children and adults to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
Mr. Biden will unveil his strategy as the new variant, known as Omicron, is encircling the globe. On Wednesday, health officials in California announced the first confirmed case of the variant, in a patient in San Francisco who arrived in the United States on Nov. 22 from South Africa.
The president has already imposed travel restrictions on people coming to the United States from eight African nations, including South Africa. Mr. Biden said earlier this week that the restrictions were intended to buy the administration time; his science advisers, including Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease specialist, have made clear that it would only be a matter of time before the variant arrived in the United States.
According to a report by NBC, there are five flights per week between Newark and Johannesburg this week by United Airlines, as well as three United Airlines flights per week between Dulles, in Washington DC, and Accra, Ghana. United will also restart service between Newark and Cape Town on Dec. 1, NBC reported.
On its website, Delta Airlines said it currently operates service between Johannesburg and Atlanta three times a week with “no planned adjustments to service at this time.”
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