Kerala witnessing Omicron wave, says Minister

Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala is witnessing a wave of Omicron infections, with cases of the highly contagious variant now on the rise, state Health Minister Veena George said on Thursday.

“It is now clear that the third wave in Kerala is the Omicron wave,” she told reporters here.

The Minister said that the Omicron variant was found in 94 percent of samples of COVID-19 patients tested as part of surveillance in the state. Delta strain was detected in 6 per cent.

As Kerala recorded 51,739 coronavirus cases on Thursday, she said sequencing of the COVID-19 samples of infected persons who came to Kerala from other places has revealed that 80 per cent of them have been affected by Omicron variant while 20 per cent were infected with Delta variant of the virus. The state logged 51,739 fresh COVID-19 cases on Thursday taking the caseload to 58.26 lakh.

The state on Tuesday had registered 55,475 cases, the highest ever single day spike in the infection since the outbreak of the pandemic in 2020. The previous highest ever in a single day was recorded on January 20- 46,387.

George said a COVID monitoring cell has been opened at her office to coordinate activities of various departments in their fight against the infection.