New Delhi: India noted what could be the death of his first Omicron on Thursday even as a very contagious variant spread to two more state, Punjab and Bihar, and recorded the highest single-day infection for the second day in a row.
While India has reported nearly 1,200 omicron cases from new variants, no deaths reported until now.
Maharashtra confirmed the existence of Omicron in a 52-year-old man who had recently died of a heart attack on Pimpri Chinchwad, but stopped calling it the first victim of the variant and linking the death of his underlying health condition.
The state added 198 cases on Thursday – the highest one-day calculation for the second day in a row – which is the main indicator that Omicron wave is here.
The total number of variants in the country has touched 450.
India reported 258 Omicron cases on Thursday, took the total calculation to 1195.
After Maharashtra, Delhi reported the second highest case, while Haryana reported 23 cases.
Telangana, Odisha and Bengal reported five cases each while Bihar and Punjab recorded one infection.
Omicron has now spread to 24 states and UTS.
The man from Pimpri Chinchwad has died on December 28 at the Yashwantrao Chavan Hospital.
The state health authority refrained from labeling as the death of omicron first even though the man had a history of traveling to Nigeria and a positive Covid diagnosis.
They said patients suffered from diabetes for the past 13 years.
“The death of this patient was caused by non-covid reasons.
By chance, the National Virology Institute report revealed that he was infected with the Omicron variant,” said the authorities in a statement.
Health experts in Mumbai said that because the man had a positive diagnosis of Covid, deaths would most likely be classified as covid death.
Throughout Maharashtra, up to 46% of the total 450 confirmed omicron cases did not have a history of international travel now.
Delhi, who recorded 25 new cases, also seemed to be towards the community spread with the Health Minister Satyendar Jain said that the new variant had been found in 54% of covid samples sent for genome sequencing.