Cabinet to discuss Omicron today

Rajesh Tope said schools must proceed with plans of reopening; no new Omicron case reported on Tuesday

MUMBAI: The state cabinet meeting scheduled on Wednesday is expected to discuss steps to be taken in the wake of the emergence of the Omicron variant of concern (VOC) after 10 cases were reported from Mumbai, Pune and Dombivli in the last three days.

State health minister Rajesh Tope said on Tuesday that no immediate restrictions are likely to come in place. “No restrictions are likely to be imposed immediately. We are watching the situation very closely and the decision about re-imposing the restrictions will be taken by consulting with the central government and task force members,” he said.

Tope said that schools should not have a problem in going ahead with their plans to reopen. The state cabinet is expected to discuss this issues as well.

The state did not report any new VOC on Tuesday.

The state reported 699 new cases of Covid-19 and 19 deaths, pushing the state tally of Covid-19 cases to 6,639,995 and the death toll to 141,194. Mumbai clocked 189 new cases and one death, taking the case tally to 764,175 and the mortality toll to 16,352. In the last 24 hours, 99,010 tests were conducted in the state, resulting in a daily positivity rate of 0.70%.

Pune logged the second-highest number of cases at 171, while Thane reported 53 cases. The state has 6,445 active cases, including the highest number of cases namely 1,668 in Mumbai; 1,031 in Thane; and 356 in Ahmednagar.

Pradeep Vyas, additional chief secretary, public health, said that authorities did not receive any report on Tuesday from samples sent for genome sequencing. As of Monday, the state has conducted RT-PCR tests of 6,898 international passengers, and 11 samples have been sent for genome sequencing since December 1. Field surveillance of all international passengers who have arrived since November 1 is underway. Through airport and field surveillance, 34 samples have been sent for genome sequencing.