India’s Omicron tally 32; symptoms mild, says govt

NEW DELHI: India’s tally of the Omicron variant of Sars-Cov-2 touched 32 as nine new infections were reported in the country on Friday, but so far all of them have exhibited mild symptoms, senior health ministry officials said, adding that there was no immediate plan to authorise vaccine boosters.

On Friday, seven new cases of the heavily mutated variant were detected in Maharashtra and two more in Gujarat, officials in the two states said. For the past three days, there had been no new case of the variant in the country.

“All Omicron positive cases have so far had mild symptoms,” said Lav Agarwal, joint secretary, Union ministry of health said, adding that close to 70 clusters are currently under investigation across India. Agarwal, who was addressing a media briefing early on Friday, said that till then there had been 25 cases of the variant in the country.

The new cases from Maharashtra were reported hours after the health ministry briefing. Infections have now been reported in four states and one Union territory – 17 in Maharashtra, nine in Rajasthan, three in Gujarat, two in Karnataka, and one in Delhi.

Officials, however, reiterated that the government’s focus remains on ensuring primary vaccination, and there was no recommendation yet from the National Technical Advisory

Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) on the booster doses.

“We are keeping an eye on global scientific studies. There is no stand of the World Health Organization (WHO) on booster doses... But WHO has clearly highlighted the need for completing primary vaccination as the most important priority and our view is also aligned with this. We have to first complete the task of vaccinating all individual with both doses,” said VK Paul, member (health), Niti Aayog.