New Delhi: India on Wednesday reported the first death related to Omicron Covid-19 variant of concern with a 73-year-old in Rajasthan’s Udaipur succumbing to the virus. The patient with several comorbidities, including severe diabetes, died last week and was confirmed Omicron positive after his demise. He was learnt to have received both vaccine doses.
The ICMR today reiterated that Covid vaccines were “disease modifying and not disease preventing vaccines”.
ICMR chief Balram Bhargava said, “You may still get infected after receiving the Covid vaccine, but you will also get a high degree of protection from severe disease and death.”
The Health Ministry confirmed India’s first Omicron death on a day when daily new cases topped 58,097, the highest in 199 days and active caseload passed the 2 lakh mark at 2,14,004, the highest in 81 days.
India added a whopping 1,38,163 active cases in nine days with the active caseload at 75,841 on December 27. The new cases have risen 6.3 times since December 29 when these were 9,195 as against 58,097 today.
With six states now reporting over 10,000 active cases as against two last week, Member, Health, NITI Aayog, VK Paul and ICMR chief said the pandemic was expanding.
The data shows that India is staring at a massive third wave as the virus reproduction number (R0 – number of people one patient can infect) soaring higher than levels reached during the height of the second wave peak in May 2020.
“We are now facing an exponential rise in Covid cases driven by the Omicron variant particularly in larger cities. The pandemic is expanding. The reproduction factor of virus is 2.69 as against 1.69 at the height of the second wave peak. Daily positivity rate has risen from 1.1 per cent on December 30, 2021, to 5 per cent today. There is no room for complacency,” said Paul.
He said although global trends revealed that Omicron surges steeply and then cases fall steeply too, the same couldn’t be extrapolated to India as conditions differ.
Government experts also warned people against taking Omicron lightly with Paul saying if the pandemic continued to expand, health systems and homes could get overwhelmed by sheer numbers of the sick.
Over 1 cr children jabbed, AP leads
- Over 1 crore children aged between 15 and 18 years have been administered the first dose of Covaxin by Wednesday
- The Health Ministry data showed that Andhra Pradesh was leading child inoculation charts having covered 39.8% beneficiaries with the first dose
- Himachal is second having covered 37% adolescents with the first dose and Gujarat is third at 30.9%
- Census shows there are 7.4 crore children aged 15 to 18 years. Overall India has administered 147.72 crore doses, as of today. TNS
National Museum closed for visitors
All galleries of National Museum, New Delhi, have been closed for visitors till further orders in view of the evolving Covid situation in Delhi. However, all departments of the National Museum will remain open as per DoPT, GoI’s, order and all protocols of Covid-19 will be followed.