‘Omicron variant has significant growth advantage over Delta’

05.01.2022

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“All pandemic indices have raised a red flag. The infection willnow continueto increase. We still have lots of unvaccinated people among the elderly. Worse, we continue to see people recklessly violating pan- demic norms. We can’t give up on masks and social distancing norms now,” said National Instituteof Epidemiology deputy director Dr Prabhdeep Kaur.

On Tuesday, Tamil Nadu reported 2,731 fresh Covid-19 infections, a 58% jump from the 1,728 it logged on Monday. Hotspot Monday.

“Omicron has a significant growthadvantage over Delta, spreading fast through communities with a doubling time of just two days,” health secretary J Radhakrishnan said on Tuesday.

The risk of transmission among close contacts, including family members, is muchhigher compared to all other variants.

“The overall risk related to the new variant is very high. Hospitalisationof the vaccinated is close to 1%, while it is 10% among those who are unvaccinated,” he said.