143 Omicron cases in India across 11 states

New Delhi, Dec 18: India's Omicron COVID count rose to 143 on Saturday after Telanaga reported twelve new cases while Karnataka, Kerala reported six and four cases respectively, and three more persons in Maharashtra also tested positive for the variant.

According to the data, omicron cases have been detected in 11 states and union territories Maharashtra (48), Delhi (22), Rajasthan (17) and Karnataka (14), Telangana (20), Gujarat (7), Kerala (11), Andhra Pradesh (1), Chandigarh (1), Tamil Nadu (1) and West Bengal (1).

Of the 12 new cases in Telangana, two were passengers from countries declared "at risk" by the Centre, while 10 came from other nations, a state health department bulletin said.

Of the six new cases in Karnataka, one is a passenger from the UK, while five others are from COVID-19 clusters in two educational institutions in Dakshina Kannada district, and their travel history or contact with the international travellers are being ascertained, officials said.

"Two cluster outbreaks of COVID have been reported from two educational institutions in Dakshina Kannada today: Cluster 1: 14 cases (of which 4 are Omicron). Cluster 2: 19 cases (1 is Omicron). A traveller from UK has also tested positive for Omicron," Karnataka Health Minister K Sudhakar said in a tweet.

In Kerala, two cases of the new variant of the coronavirus were detected from Thiruvananthapuram in patients aged 17 and 44. One case was detected in Malappuram in a person aged 37 and another was a 49-year-old patient from Thrissur district.

"The 17-year-old patient in Thiruvananthapuram came from the UK while the 44-year-old reached the state from Tunisia in a chartered flight. The patient in Malappuram came from Tanzania while the Thrissur native came from Kenya," Health Minister Veena George said in a release.

A couple and their 13-year-old daughter have tested positive for the Omicron variant of coronavirus after returning to Satara in western Maharashtra from Uganda, officials said.

Their other daughter, who is five years old, tested positive for COVID-19 but not for the variant.

All four returned to Phaltan in Satara district from the African country on December 9, state health department officials said.

"The husband (35), wife (33) and their elder daughter (13) tested positive for COVID-19 while the report of the younger child was inconclusive, so the samples of all four were sent to the National Institute of Virology for genome sequencing," said Civil Surgeon Dr Subhash Chavan.

The Centre has warned it is likely that the spread of the new variant will outpace the Delta variant where there is community transmission.

It has advised people to avoid non-essential travel and mass gatherings and keep New Year celebrations at low intensity.

While the country's first two cases of the Omicron variant were detected in Karnataka on December 2, this heavily mutated version of the coronavirus was first reported in South Africa on November 24.