Karnataka Health Department officials on Sunday, December 5 confirmed two other COVID-19 clusters emerging in the state amidst the new scare surrounding the Omicron variant of the coronavirus. So far only two patients in the state have been found to be infected by the new variant. In the first incident reported on Sunday, 69 people, including 59 students of the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya (JNV) in Chikkamagaluru, tested positive.
“We had conducted tests on 457 people in the JNV here, of which 59 students and 10 staff members tested positive for coronavirus. They are asymptomatic but we have isolated them,” District Health Officer Dr SN Umesh told PTI. The officer added that the test reports of all the people who were tested had arrived and only 69 were found to be infected. Umesh also said the teaching and other staff members in the JNV have been vaccinated.
According to sources in the district administration, the school has been temporarily sealed, and doctors and paramedical staff have been deployed there. Rooms are also being sanitised, they added.
In another instance, 42 persons, including students of the Nanjappa Institute of Nursing Sciences in the outskirts of Shivamogga city, tested positive. Officials confirmed that even in this cluster, no hospitalisation was required. A total of more than 900 persons were subjected to tests.
Schools and colleges in the state, especially residential ones, are witnessing a spurt in COVID-19 cases. However, the severity of the infection and fatalities are almost nil in these places and most of the students and staff members are asymptomatic.
Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai had on Saturday, December 4 said that COVID-19 cases are appearing in two types of clusters – one in schools and colleges, and second in residential apartments in Bengaluru. He added that any area with three or more cases of coronavirus in the state would be declared a cluster