Eight fresh cases – six from Pune district – take state’s Omicron tally to 40

Dr Pradeep Awate, state surveillance officer, said all eight patients were men in the 29-45 age group. Their samples were taken in the first week of December. Dr Awate said that of the eight patients only one had mild symptoms while the rest were asymptomatic.

According to preliminary information, four patients from Pune have a history of travel to Dubai while two were their contacts. One patient from Mumbai had travelled to the US and the other patient from Kalyan-Dombivli had travelled to Nigeria.

According to Ayush Prasad, chief executive officer of Pune Zilla Parishad, all six patients were asymptomatic and admitted to the isolation facility at Rural Hospital, Narayangaon. According to Prasad, the patients were tested on December 11 and 12 at Naryangaon, Junnar, and samples were sent to BJMC for genomic sequencing. On December 17, their samples were found positive with Omicron variant. Five of these patients are fully vaccinated while one is yet to take the second dose. As many as 15 close contacts of the patients have been traced and RT-PCR tests have been conducted on them.

Dr Rohit Allat, medical officer in charge at the Narayangaon Rural Hospital, a dedicated Covid health centre, said the patients were doing fine and will be kept under observation for at least 10-14 days as per the protocol. According to health officials, two persons were from Narayangaon while four were from a nearby village in Junnar tehsil. Two of them were friends who had returned from Dubai while the other four were not related to each other.

Of the 40 patients detected with Omicron variant in the state, 14 are from Mumbai, two from Kalyan-Dombivli, two from Osmanabad, and one each from Latur, Buldhana, Nagpur, and Vasai-Virar. Out of these, 25 cases have been discharged following a negative RT-PCR test.

From December 1, as many as 19,165 passengers arriving from foreign countries at Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur airports have been tested for Covid-19. Of these, 61 were found to be Covid positive and their samples sent for genome sequencing. Additionally, field surveillance of all international passengers who had arrived since November 1 is underway. Through airport and field surveillance, 525 samples have been sent for genomic sequencing. Results of 79 people are awaited so far, Dr Awate said.

Meanwhile, 902 new Covid-19 cases were reported in the state on Friday, taking the total tally in Maharashtra to 66,47,840.