HYDERABAD: Telangana is on the verge of community transmission of the Omicron variant of the Coronavirus with three cases of Omicron infection announced on Tuesday, about which the state health department said it could not trace the source of the infection.
All the three Omicron cases of which the sources could not be traced were found in Hyderabad. The infected patients are a pregnant woman, a techie, and a dialysis technician at a hospital. The department, however, did not say when these cases were discovered.
On Tuesday, the department said a total of 7 new cases of the variant were found in the state, of which three were international arrivals from at-risk countries, and four were from not-at-risk countries. Tuesday’s addition to the Omicron cases took the tally of this variant to 62 in the state.
A senior health department official told Deccan Chronicle that these three cases could not be technically termed as community transmission of the variant, but sporadic cases. The official, however, added that these cases would see a spike in the days to come, and when they began occurring in hundreds, only it could be called community transmission.
Meanwhile, health minister T. Harish Rao said an analysis of the 62 cases had shown that 46 of those found infected with the Omicron variant from among the international travellers were not vaccinated. “This goes to show that most of the Omicron cases are among the unvaccinated. This should give all of us further impetus to get vaccinated against Covid. Every one of us has a responsibility to get fully vaccinated, and encourage others to do the same,” the minister told reporters at a press conference.
He said according to doctors at the Telangana Institute of Medical Sciences (TIMS), all patients who tested Omicron positive were either asymptomatic, or had very mild symptoms. He also said so far, 13 of the Omicron positive patients had been discharged after recovery from the TIMS.
Harish Rao said there was no reason for any fear or worry on the Omicron front as the state was fully geared up to meet this challenge.
