Two days after a 33-year-old unvaccinated man who returned from South Africa to Dombivali tested positive for the Omicron variant of Covid-19, two people from Mumbai's Western suburbs have been found positive for Omicron.
A 37-year-old man, who landed in the city from Johannesburg, South Africa, on November 25, and his 36-year-old woman friend, who arrived in Mumbai from the US on the same day, have tested positive for the latest Covid variant. Both of them were residing in Mumbai's Western suburbs.
Maharashtra's Omicron tally now stands at ten, with three cases in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region, six in Pimpri-Chinchwad, and one in Pune.
The Health Department officials said that the National Institute for Virology in Pune confirmed the two Mumbai cases in its report. “Both patients have no symptoms and are admitted to SevenHills Hospital (in Marol),” the Health Department note said. It added that both patients were inoculated with Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccine. The two had undergone RT-PCR on November 29 and 30 respectively, which came out positive for Covid, following which their samples were sent to the National Institute for Virology for genome sequencing.
The Health Department officials said that five high-risk and 315 low-risk contacts of the two have been traced, and further tracing was under way.
On Saturday, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region got its first Omicron case when a 33-year-old unvaccinated man in Dombivali was found positive for the latest variant. He had arrived in Mumbai from Cape Town via Dubai and New Delhi on November 24. His 12 high-risk contacts and 23 low-risk contacts were traced and found negative for Covid-19. Additionally, 25 of his co-passengers on the Delhi-Mumbai flight also tested negative.
The state government’s Covid taskforce has called for an all-round vigilance, and said there was a need to study whether in the next few weeks Omicron will displace the Delta variant to become the dominant variant in circulation. “There are suspect cases and there might be a few more confirmations but for now, we have to follow Covid-appropriate behaviour and get vaccinated. Regarding in-bound travel, we need to have very tight screening and tracing of all coming in from abroad because Omicron is everywhere. They have to ensure home quarantine and if anyone is asymptomatic they should go for testing voluntarily,” Dr Shashank Joshi, a taskforce member, said.
Health experts said that there was not enough clarity on the severity of the current infection rate caused by Omicron, and more information was expected in the next two weeks. “We need to go back to the basics of tracing, testing and treating. As we have seen, cases take a month or two to rise after a new variant is found to be in circulation,” said Dr Rahul Pandit, member of the National Covid-19 taskforce.
Meanwhile, Additional Municipal Commissioner Suresh Kakani said the number of fliers who have tested Covid-positive has increased to 29, of which 20 were international travellers and nine had been found via contact tracing. “There is no cause for panic in Mumbai. We have adequate medical infrastructure in place to handle any increase in cases,” he said.
Give booster doses, IMA tells government
The Indian Medical Association (IMA) on Monday urged the government to announce "additional" doses of Covid vaccine for healthcare, frontline workers and immunocompromised individuals amid concerns over the Omicron variant of coronavirus. It also demanded that the government expedite the proposal of vaccinating individuals aged 12 to 18 years. “t a time when India is limbing back to normalcy, this is a great setback. If we do not take adequate measures, we may have a massive third wave,” IMA said.
Kin of Guj Omicron patient test positive
The wife and brother-in-law of an NRI man, who had been found infected with Omicron in Gujarat's Jamnagar, have tested positive for coronavirus and their samples have been sent for genome sequencing. Both of them were shifted to an isolation ward, said a release issued by the Jamnagar Municipal corporation. On December 4, the genome sequencing established that the 72-year-old NRI man, who arrived from Zimbabwe, one of the 'at-risk countries, had' contracted the Omicron variant of Covid-19. The man had taken both the doses of a Chinese vaccine in Zimbabwe.
Samples of 246 foreign returnees to be tested
Amid the Omicron threat, 246 samples of returnees from at-risk countries in Odisha were sent to the Institute of Life Sciences (ILS), Bhubaneswar, for genome sequencing, an official said on Monday. According to sources, over 800 persons returned to the state from foreign countries since the detection of the Omicron variant of Covid-19.
