New Delhi: The Omicron strain – first detected in South Africa last week and since in over a dozen countries since, including the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, and Hong Kong – has not yet been detected in India, government officials have said.Faced with the threat of Omicron – the new highly transmissible coronavirus strain that poses a “very high” global risk – the government today called on states and UTs to scale up Covid testing rates for early identification and management of cases.Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan met with senior officials to underline the fact Omicron does not, at this time, escape detection from existing Covid tests, including (crucially) the cheaper and faster antigen tests that experts have said often returns a false negative.States and UTs have been asked to ensure augmentation of health infrastructure and supervised home isolation, as well as focusing on intensive containment, active surveillance, monitoring of hotspots, and widening vaccine coverage.The Omicron strain – first detected in South Africa last week and since in over a dozen countries since, including the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, and Hong Kong – has not yet been detected in India, government officials have said.Last week Mr Bhushan wrote to state and UT governments to stress on rigorous surveillance of international passengers and ensure the prompt dispatch of samples for genome sequencing (to rapidly identify strains), as well as strict enforcement of Covid-appropriate behaviour.The Omicron strain – earlier identified as B.1.1.529 and now designated by the World Health Organization’s (WHO) as a ‘variant of concern’ – is believed to have 50 mutations, including over 30 on the spike protein and 10 on the receptor binding domain.The spike protein is the target of most current COVID-19 vaccines and is what the virus uses to unlock access to our body’s cells. Researchers are still trying to confirm whether this makes it more transmissible or lethal than earlier variants, and if existing vaccines can protect against the strain.The centre on Sunday introduced strict guidelines for people travelling from or transiting through ‘at-risk’ countries (these include those with confirmed ‘Omicron’ cases) and issued a slew of directions to states and UTs for ramping up testing-surveillance measures and health facilities.It also decided to review the resumption of international flights.The countries designated as ”at-risk” (updated as of November 26) include European countries, the UK, South Africa, Brazil, Bangladesh, Botswana, China, Mauritius, New Zealand, Zimbabwe, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Israel.With input from PTI
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