Hyderabad: No case of the new Omicron variant of COVID-19 has been reported in Telangana, informed the state health department on Monday.
The state health department said, “No Omicron variant in Telangana as of now. All the 13 Covid positive samples of International travellers which were sent for Genomic sequencing have tested negative.”
Several cases of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 have been detected in the country with Karnataka, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Delhi reporting new cases. On Monday two more Omicron cases were detected in Mumbai taking the tally of India to 23.
The first two cases of the Omicron variant were reported in the country in Karnataka, followed by one in Gujarat’s Jamnagar and then another in Maharashtra’s Dombivili.
The new variant of COVID-19 was first reported to the World Health Organisation (WHO) from South Africa on November 25. As per the WHO, the first known confirmed B.1.1.529 infection was from a specimen collected on November 9 this year.
On November 26, the WHO named the new COVID-19 variant B.1.1.529, which has been detected in South Africa, as ‘Omicron’. The WHO has classified Omicron as a ‘variant of concern’.