Saturday, 11 December 2021 | PNS | New Delhi
Omicron cases rise to 32 in India; Govt asks people to follow Covid-19 appropriate norms
Concerned at the declining mask usage in the country to pre-second surge level, the Government on Friday warned people not to be lax and instead take a cue from increasing Omicron cases across the countries and adopt appropriate Covid-19 behaviour seriously.
“WHO is warning against the decline in mask usage. The global scene of Omicron is disturbing… We are now operating at a risky and unacceptable level. We have to remember that both vaccines and masks are important,” Dr VK Paul, the NITI Aayog member for Health, said at a press briefing here.
Clinically, Omicron is not yet posing a burden on the healthcare system but vigil has to be maintained, he said.
Meanwhile, two more Covid-19 cases of Omicron variant were reported in Gujarat and 7 in Maharashtra on Friday. With this, India’s tally of the new variant infection rose to 32.
While in Gujarat, the wife and the brother-in-law of an NRI man, who had been found infected with the Omicron variant of Covid-19 in Gujarat’s Jamnagar a week back, were detected with the new strain, in Dharavi a 49-year-old, who returned from Tanzania on December 4, tested positive for Omicron variant. He had not taken any vaccine but has been asymptomatic, the Government said.
“All cases have mild symptoms. Omicron cases account for less than 0.04 per cent of total variants detected,” Lav Agarwal, joint secretary at the Union Health Ministry, said at a briefing.
“Since December 1, total of 93 international passengers have tested positive for Covid-19. Of these, 83 are from countries that have been designated “at-risk” given the Omicron breakout and 13 from other countries,” Agarwal said.
“Two countries had reported Omicron cases till November, 24. Now, 59 countries have reported cases of Omicron. These 59 countries have reported 2,936 Omicron cases. Besides this, 78,054 probable cases have also been detected — their genome sequencing is underway,” the official said.
The Centre said the treatment protocol for the Omicron variant remained the same.
The Health Ministry said the overall positivity rate in the country was at 0.73 per cent last week. Less than 10,000 cases have been reported in the last 14 days.
Active cases are highest in two States — Kerala and Maharashtra– with over 43 per cent active cases in the former and over 10 per cent in the latter, Agarwal said.
“We are administering up to 80 lakh doses of vaccines per day and it has to be continued to cover the entire adult population,” Balram Bhargava, Director-General of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), said at the briefing.
With 8,503 people testing positive for the coronavirus in a day, India’s Covid-19 tally has climbed to 3,46,74,744, while the number of active cases rose to 94,943, according to the Ministry’s data updated on Friday.
The death toll mounted to 4,74,735 with the addition of 624 new fatalities, according to the data updated at 8 a.m. The daily rise in new coronavirus infections has been recorded below 15,000 for the last 43 days now. The number of active cases has increased to 94,943, comprising 0.27 per cent of the total infections, the lowest since March 2020, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate was recorded at 98.36 per cent, the highest since March 2020, the Ministry said.
