Lagatar24 Desk
Bhubaneswar, Dec 21: Odisha reported first two cases of the newly detected Omicron Covid variant on Tuesday, informed Director of Institute of Life Sciences (ILS), Bhubaneswar, Ajay Parida.
The new variant was confirmed following genome sequencing. According to the sources, the affected persons had returned from Nigeria recently and the other arrived from Qatar. Both the infected are from Jagatsinghpur and Khordha districts and their condition is stated to be stable.
“Since November 21, we are keeping under surveillance people returning from foreign countries irrespective of ‘at risk’ or other countries. More than 8,800 international passengers have entered Odisha. The number of passengers from ‘at risk’ countries is around 1,600,” said Niranjan Mishra, Director of Public Health, Odisha.
“Of total the 8,800 infected passengers, only 12, who had undergone RT-PCR tests, have tested positive. These samples were sent for genome sequencing. We have been informed that only two of them tested positive for Omicron,” he added.
