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India's first Omicron cases reported in Karnataka; no need to panic, says Centre

A foreign national and a health worker tested positive for the new COVID variant

[File] A security personnel at the Bengaluru International Airport | Bhanu Prakash Chandra [File] A security personnel at the Bengaluru International Airport | Bhanu Prakash Chandra

For the first time in India, two COVID-19 cases of the Omicron variant have been detected in Karnataka, the government said on Thursday. The patients are two men aged 66 and 46.

“Two cases of Omicron have been detected in Karnataka through genome sequencing effort of INSACOG consortium of 37 laboratories established by the Ministry of Health. We need not panic, but awareness is absolutely essential,” said Dr Balram Bhargava, director general of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) at a press conference.

The 66-year-old is a foreign national who had travelled to Bengaluru earlier this month before the Centre's Omicron travel rules came into force, while the other person is a health worker. Dr Bhargava said all the primary and secondary contacts of both the cases have been traced and are being tested.

The government stated that 373 cases of Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 have been detected in 29 nations so far and India was monitoring the situation.

“All Omicron related cases are found to have mild symptoms so far...In all such cases in the country and across the world so far, no severe symptom has been noted,” said Lav Agarwal, joint secretary of the Union health ministry.

He said a surge in cases is being noted across the world with Europe alone reporting 70 per cent of the cases in the last one week. “In the week ending November 28, around 2.75 Lakh new cases and over 31,000 deaths were reported in the European region”.

However, the Southeast Asian region that includes India and 11 other countries, reported only 1.2 lakh cases in the last one week—only 3.1 per cent of the cases of the world. “A decrease in cases is being reported in the Southeast Asian region,” Agarwal claimed.

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