Centre asks Bengaluru, 7 other cities to monitor community transmission of Omicron

What is worrying officials most is 51 Covid-19 cases in seven states without any travel history

The Centre on Wednesday asked eight major cities, including Bengaluru, to watch out for “community transmission” of the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, as the number of such cases crossed the 220-mark spanning 15 states.

“Delhi, Bengaluru, Bhubaneshwar, Chennai, Mumbai, Pune, Hyderabad and Kolkata were identified as cities for monitoring community transmission of the Omicron variant. Accordingly, it was decided that all RT-PCR positive samples from these cities would be sent for whole genome sequencing at designated laboratories,” Sujeet K Singh, Director of the National Centre for Disease Control wrote to the states in a letter.

Health Ministry sources said the number of Omicron cases was currently at 222, with Maharashtra accounting for the most (65) followed by Delhi (54).

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However, what is worrying the officials most is 51 such cases in seven states — Maharashtra, Gujarat, Telangana, Karnataka, Kerala, Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir — without any travel history. This gives the first signal of the Omicron's community transmission in India with the experts noting that the numbers will start rising soon.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday will review the Omicron situation with top officials. The last such review chaired by the PM was held on November 27, in which it was decided to have a relook at the opening up of international travel. The review was held a day after the World Health Organization designated the Omicron as a "variant of concern."

“It's only a matter of time before there is local transmission of Omicron. We simply don't have the evidence to understand how many of such cases will need hospitalisation in India. The South African evidence suggests it could be a large wave of infections but not a large wave of hospitalisations and deaths,” public health researcher Ramanan Laxminarayan, Director, Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, Delhi, told DH.

Also Read — West Bengal issues guidelines for Covid-19 positive international arrivals

Amid a rise in Covid-19 cases and the threat of the Omicron variant, the Delhi Disaster Management Authority directed district magistrates to ensure no Christmas and New Year gathering takes place in the national capital. The authority asked the district magistrates to identify potential Covid-19 super-spreader areas ahead of Christmas and New Year celebrations. The district magistrates and deputy commissioners of police have been directed to tighten the enforcement machinery to ensure that people follow social-distancing norms and wear masks.

The Union Health Ministry on Tuesday alerted the states on Omicron's ability to spread three times faster than Delta, advising them to activate 'war rooms' and imposing curbs and restrictions if the test positivity rate in an area goes up to 10 per cent or if the occupancy of ICU and oxygen beds is 40 per cent.

Touching a six-month high, Delhi recorded 125 new Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, taking the tally of active cases to 624, which is the highest in the past five months.

Last week, a disease model suggested R or reproductive number would be greater than one in almost all the metros, a clear sign of the epidemic growing in urban India.

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