On Thursday Maharashtra confirmed that a 52-year-old omicron patient died of heart attack at Yashwantrao Chavan Hospital in Pimpri Chinchwad, but stopped short of calling him the first casualty of the variant and attributed the death to his health conditions. This highly infectious variant spread in two more states Punjab and Bihar and recorded highest single-day infections for the second consecutive day.
The state health authorities refrained from labelling it as the first Omicron death despite the man having a travel history to Nigeria and a Covid positive diagnosis. They said the patient had diabetes for the past 13 years. The authorities said, “The death of this patient is due to non-Covid reasons. Coincidently, the National Institute of Virology report revealed that he was infected with the Omicron variant.”
The state recorded 198 cases on Thursday which is a major indicator that the Omicron wave is here. The total no of cases is 450. India reported 258 Omicron cases on Thursday, taking the total tally to 1195. After Maharashtra, Delhi reported the second highest cases 25, while Haryana reported 23 cases. Telangana, Odisha and Bengal reported five cases each while Bihar and Punjab recorded one infection each. Omicron has now spread to 24 states and UTs.
