New Delhi: India on Friday reported its second Omicron-related death from Odisha, confirmed Balangir's Chief District Medical Officer (CDMO) Dr Snehalata Sahu.
The deceased, identified as a 50-year-old woman, was suffering from a brain stroke, Dr Sahu said. She was admitted to Burla Medical College where she tested COVID positive.
She died on December 27, 2021, Dr Sahu added.
Dr Sahu said that the victim's genome sequencing report, which came out after her death, had confirmed that she was Omicron positive.
She added that on getting the report, the district administration went to the victim's village Agalpur for further tracing of her contacts, and said their testing is underway.
The daily rise in coronavirus infections was recorded above one lakh after 214 days, taking India's total tally of COVID-19 cases to 3,52,26,386 which includes 3,007 cases of Omicron reported across 27 states and UTs, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Friday.
Out of the total Omicron cases reported so far, 1,199 people have recovered or migrated. Maharashtra recorded the maximum number of 876 cases followed by Delhi at 465, Karnataka 333, Rajasthan 291, Kerala 284 and Gujarat 204.
On Wednesday, the country reported its first Omicron-related death from the state of Rajasthan. The victim, a 73-year-old man, had died on December 31 infected with the new Omicron variant.
He died due to post-Covid pneumonia along with co-morbidities – diabetes, hypertension and hypothyroidism, officials said. They added that the man was fully vaccinated and had no significant contact and travel history.
Amid a whopping spike in Covid-19 cases, the Union health ministry on Wednesday released revised guidelines for home isolation for mild and asymptomatic infections, saying such patients will stand discharged after at least seven days from testing positive and no fever for three successive days.
Earlier, home isolation lasted 10 days from the onset of symptoms.
The health ministry also advised people not to rush for self-medication, blood investigation or radiological imaging like chest X-rays or CT scans without consulting a doctor.
The health ministry home isolation guidelines specify that the treatment of every patient must be monitored individually as per his/her specific condition, and hence generic sharing of prescriptions should be avoided. It said the district administration, under the overall supervision of the state health authority, shall be responsible for monitoring patients under home isolation.
The government has also decided not to go for mix-and-match for the Covid-19 “precautionary” vaccine dose, which is to be administered to healthcare/frontline workers and senior citizens aged 60 and above with co-morbidities from January 10.
This means those who have taken two doses of Covishield will get the same vaccine as their precautionary jab, and those who got two doses of Covaxin will get the same vaccine as well.
