Omicron has started replacing Delta variant in India, say sources - what it implies

According to the health ministry earlier today, 1,270 cases of Omicron have been detected so far from 23 states and Union territories. Cases are continuing to rise as states are adding more cases

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As cases of Omicron steadily grow across India, it seems that it might soon become the dominant Covid-19 strain in the country, as in many parts of the world. "Omicron has started replacing Delta variant of coronavirus in India in terms of number of cases, " said official sources, as quoted by ANI.

On December 31, India saw a massive spike in COVID cases with 16,764 fresh infections and 220 Covid-related fatalities reported in the last 24 hours. It was after 64 days that the daily rise in the number of coronavirus cases crossed the 16,000 mark, taking the country’s COVID-19 tally to 3,48,38,804. The number of active cases of the infection has gone up to 91,361, according to the data.

#Omicron has started replacing Delta variant in India: Official Sources — ANI (@ANI) December 31, 2021

India's Omicrom crossed 1,000 on December 30, on the back of Maharashtra reporting its highest single-day infection with the new strain, as states further tightened measures to deal with the surge in coronavirus cases.

Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain, meanwhile, said Omicron is gradually spreading in the community and the variant of concern has been found in 46 per cent of the latest samples of regular COVID cases analysed in the national capital.

According to the health ministry earlier today, there were 1,270 cases of Omicron detected so far from 23 states and Union territories. Almost 374 of those patients have been discharged. Leading the Omicron tally are Maharashtra and Delhi with 450 and 320 cases respectively. On Thursday night, Bihar joined the list of states to report a case of the new variant. Today, Kerala Health Minister Veena George confirmed to ANI that the state recorded "44 fresh confirmed cases of Omicron, taking total cases of the coronavirus variant to 107 in Kerala.

The fast-spreading Omicron variant is likely to soon replace the Delta strain globally, experts in Singapore have already warned, as countries after countries have reported a record surge in Covid cases.

"From current data, it looks like Delta will go down over time relative to Omicron," Dr Sebastian Maurer-Stroh, executive director of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research Bioinformatics Institute in Singapore, told The Straits Times on Wednesday.

Professor Dale Fisher, a senior consultant at the National University Hospital's Division of Infectious Diseases, said that Omicron is already dominant in Australia, India, Russia, South Africa and the UK, reported IANS. "We are seeing a global transition from Delta to Omicron because with a greater transmissibility, the virus is fitter and has a reproductive advantage," Fisher was quoted as saying.

(With Agency inputs)