Omicron Variant Live Updates: Omicron could cause up to 75,000 deaths in UK by April end, study warns

The UK has seen its first death from Omicron, even as the latest variant of the coronavirus is expected to comprise 50 per cent of the cases in London by Tuesday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday.

"Sadly yes, Omicron is producing hospitalisations and sadly at least one patient has been confirmed to have died with Omicron.

"So I think the idea that this is somehow a milder version of the virus, I think that's something we need to set on one side and just recognise the sheer pace at which it accelerates through the population. So the best thing we can do is all get our boosters," he said during his visit to vaccination clinic near Paddington, in west London, according to media reports.

Omicron now represents about 40 per cent of coronavirus cases in London and is set to rise to over 50 per cent in a day.

"The risk is plainly there, we can see Omicron spiking now in London and some other parts of the country," Johnson said.

"Here in the capital it probably represents about 40 per cent of the cases. By tomorrow it'll be the majority of the cases and it's increasing the whole time."

The Karnataka police have arrested four persons in connection with providing a fake RT-PCR certificate to a 66-year-old South African national who tested positive for Covid-19, sources in the Health Department said on Monday.

The South African, who was undergoing quarantine in a five star hotel after testing positive for Covid-19, had managed to escape to his country by producing a fake RT-PCR negative report before the authorities.

According to police, two employees who worked in a software company in Bengaluru owned by the South African, and two staff members of a private lab, have been arrested for making the fake RT-PCR report.

However, the South African fled to his country via Dubai through the fake report.

A woman, who was found infected with COVID-19 here after returning from the UK, tested negative for the Omicron variant of coronavirus, a health department official said on Monday. She contracted the Delta Plus strain of coronavirus, he said.

The woman was found positive for the disease on December 10, and her sample was sent for genome sequencing to ascertain whether she had contracted the new Omicron variant, which has been classified as a highly transmissible virus of concern.

Pakistan’s top anti-coronavirus body confirmed on Monday that the country's first Omicron variant has been detected in an unvaccinated woman through gene sequencing.

The confirmation made by the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) came days after a 57-year-old woman in Karachi was suspected of getting infected by the new COVID-19 variant.

The Omicron variant of coronavirus could cause between 25,000 and 75,000 COVID-19 related deaths in the UK by April next year, if additional control measures were not taken, according to a modelling study.

Four fresh cases of Omicron variant of Covid-19 have been detected in Rajasthan which took the total number of infected people in the state to 13, health officials said on Monday.

After Maharashtra, the state now stands second in the country with the highest number of Omicron-infected patients.

Maharashtra has 18 patients infected by the new variant while Rajasthan has tested 13 patients positive for Omicron.

Out of them, 9 later tested negative and were sent home.

New Zealand's largest city of Auckland and other areas, which have been seriously affected by the latest community outbreak of the Covid-19 Delta variant, will further relax restrictions at the end of the year, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced on Monday.

All regions under "red" in the "traffic light" Covid-19 protection framework, excluding Northland, will move into "orange" from 11.59 p.m. local time on December 30, which means unrestricted life for the vaccinated people, as venues that use vaccine passes face no limits in the scale of gatherings, reports Xinhua news agency.

Addressing a press conference, she said the areas to move from "red" to "orange" include Auckland, Taupo, Rotorua lakes districts, and Gisborne among other areas in the North Island.

Israel has decided to ban travel to the UK and Denmark to prevent the spread of the new Omicron Covid-19 variant. The ban, to be effective on Thursday, was announced at a press conference by Sharon Alroy-Preis, head of the public health services at the Health Ministry, reports Xinhua news agency.

Over 13 million people have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 across Myanmar, according to the Ministry of Health on Sunday. Meanwhile, more than 5.79 million people have received the first jab, reports Xinhua news agency.

According to the Ministry's figures, Myanmar reported 280 new Covid-19 cases with daily test positivity rate of 2.43 per cent and six more deaths in the past 24 hours.

The number of Covid-19 infections has increased to 526,661, while the death toll has reached 19,183.

So far, total of 503,107 patients have been discharged from hospitals and over 5.79 million samples have been tested for the.

 People previously infected with COVID-19 and those vaccinated will have some "stronger than basic" protection against Omicron, according to one of the earliest peer-reviewed studies looking into the recently identified variant of coronavirus.

Three persons, who arrived from London to the KempeGowda International Airport (KIAL) in Bengaluru, have tested positive for Covid-19 in RT-PCR tests, health department sources said on Monday.

The Nigerian government has announced its intention to ban arrivals from Canada, Britain, Argentina and Saudi Arabia from Tuesday, after the four countries added Nigeria on their "red list" and banned foreign travels from the country after detection of a new coronavirus variant.

The decision was to reciprocate restricted flights from Nigeria into those countries over the new Covid-19 variant Omicron, said Aviation Minister, Hadi Sirika on Sunday at a news conference in Lagos, Nigeria's economic hub.

Sirika added that if those countries placed Nigeria on a red list, they lacked the moral right to have their airlines fly into Nigeria on commercial operations, Xinhua news agency reported.

China has reported a sudden flare-up of COVID-19 cases in Zhejiang Province which registered 138 locally-transmitted confirmed cases stated to be that of Delta strain "sub-lineage AY.4", prompting officials to bar millions of people in the eastern province from travelling outside.

Zhejiang Province has registered 138 locally-transmitted confirmed COVID-19 cases and one asymptomatic carrier between December 5-12, amid the latest COVID-19 resurgence, state-run Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

All the primary and secondary contacts of the person, who tested positive for Omicron variant, have tested negative for Covid-19, sources in the health department stated on Monday.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa is receiving treatment for mild Covid-19 symptoms after testing positive for the virus, an official statement said on Monday.

The President, who is fully vaccinated, started feeling unwell after leaving the State Memorial Service in honour of former Deputy President FW de Klerk in Cape Town earlier on Sunday, Xinhua news agency quoted the statement as saying.

Korean researchers have developed molecular diagnostics technology that can detect Omicron variants. The technology development has been currently completed, and it is expected to take time for commercialization.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa is receiving treatment for mild COVID-19 symptoms after testing positive for the disease Sunday, his office said. Ramaphosa started feeling unwell and a test confirmed COVID-19, a statement from the presidency announced. He is self-isolating in Cape Town and is being monitored by the South African Military Health Service, the statement said. He has delegated all responsibilities to Deputy President David Mabuza for the next week. Ramaphosa, 69, is fully vaccinated. The statement didn’t say whether he had been infected with the omicron coronavirus variant.

Nagpur reported its first Omicron case on Sunday with a 40-year-old man testing positive for this variant of coronavirus after returning from South Africa, which took Maharashtra's count of such cases to 18, the state health department said. The man from Nagpur had arrived in the state from South Africa on December 5. A report by the National Institute of Virology (NIV) said that he has mild symptoms of the infection. He is currently in isolation at AIIMS Nagpur, it said.

The patient has not taken any anti-coronavirus vaccine so far, the department said in a statement. His 30 close contacts were traced and all of them have tested negative for the infection. The new patient is a case of re-infection. He was earlier diagnosed with COVID-19 on April 11 this year, but his symptoms were mild and did not require hospitalisation, it added. Talking to PTI, Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) commissioner Radhakrishnan B said the patient's condition is stable. "We will be monitoring him closely," he said.