India’s Omicron case count rises to 253; Karnataka’s up to 31

A total of 12 more Omicron cases were reported in Karnataka on Thursday (December 23) as the state’s tally went up to 31.

State Health Minister Dr Sudhakar K said that of the 12 fresh cases, 10 are from Bengaluru. Five of them just came back from the UK, one from Denmark, and one from Nigeria. The other two cases have been reported in Mysore (both had returned from Switzerland) and Mangaluru (returned from Ghana).

India’s Omicron case count, by Thursday evening, went up to 253. Maharashtra has the most number of cases (65) followed by Delhi with 64 cases. Karnataka has 31 cases, Kerala 29 and Telangana 24 cases.

The country’s active COVID-19 caseload currently stands at 78,291, while the recovery rate is 98.40 per cent, which is the highest since March 2020. Total 7,495 new cases of Covid-19 were reported in the past 24 hours, while 6,960 patients recovered in hospitals across the country. A total of 434 deaths were reported in the last 24 hours.

Also read: Delhi ready to handle up to 1 lakh cases a day, says Kejriwal

Earlier in the day, Union Health Ministry Rajesh Bhushan has alerted states and Union Territories about the new COVID-19 variant, saying based on current scientific evidence, Omicron is at least “three times more transmissible” than the Delta variant.

Union health secretary, in his letter, asserted that Omicron is three times as infectious as the Delta variant of coronavirus and war rooms must be activated to contain it.