Bhubaneswar, Dec 21: A man who returned from Nigeria and another who came from Qatar have been detected with the Omicron variant of Covid-19 in Odisha. As per health official sources, both are asymptomatic and 21 contacts traced have found tested negative so far.
A high level team of state health dept. is on alert. Genome sequencing test of these 21 contacts was done at the Institute of Life Science (ILS) here. One of the Omicron patients has no Covid symptoms, the other had only cough. Both of them had returned from non-risk countries. ILS sources also confirms that these two Omicron variant positive are the first cases reported in the eastern state.
The Nigeria-returnee is from Jagatsinghpur and he has been admitted in Cuttack. The Qatar returnee is from Khordha district and has been admitted to a Bhubaneswar hospital.
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Health department sources said so far 8,800 people have returned to the state from abroad and 1,600 of them returned from countries designated as ‘risk’. Only 12 returnees from abroad tested Covid positive in the RT-PCR test. During the genome sequencing of these patients, only two were detected with the Omicron variant of the virus.
A high-level meeting has been conducted at the Lok Seva Bhawan attended by senior health department officials and other officials concerned to discuss the strategies after the detection of two Omicron variants in the state.
