No cases of Omicron in Mizoram: IDSP

Mizoram Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) officer Dr Pachuau Lalmalsawma, on December 28, clarified that the state is currently free from the highly transmissible Omicron variant following negative reports of two persons who had returned from Australia and Singapore respectively.

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AIZAWL:

Mizoram Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) officer Dr Pachuau Lalmalsawma, on December 28, clarified that the state is currently free from the highly transmissible Omicron variant following negative reports of two persons who had returned from Australia and Singapore respectively.

The returnees had earlier tested positive for Covid-19, and their samples were sent to West Bengal to find if they were infected with the new variant of Coronavirus.

“As the two foreign returnees had tested positive for COVID-19, their samples were sent to National Institute of Biomedical Genomics, Kalyani, West Bengal, for genome sequencing on December 22. We received the results on December 27 and no trace of Omicron was found,” Lalmalsawma said.

The health official, however, stressed the need to take utmost precaution during the present festive season with the state still registering high positive rates and the presence of Delta variants.

On December 28, Mizoram registered 10.27 per cent positivity rate as 184 new cases were detected from 1,729 samples. 

The new cases put the state’s tally to 1,40,748, while active cases stood at 1,276.

In addition to that, the death toll rose to 539, following reports of 2 more deaths on December 28.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) handed over test kits worth Rs 4 crores to Mizoram on Tuesday. The South Korean made 3,60,000 numbers of Rapid Antigen Test kits and 1,80,000 numbers of RT-PCR test kits were received by State Health Minister R Lalthangliana from WHO Surveillance Medical Officer Dr Lalhlimpuii.

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