Omicron variant! One more foreign national tests Covid positive in Mathura, tally at 4

One more foreigner has tested positive amid concerns of omicron covid variant. The foreigner has been identified as a 41-year-old woman from Austria who had come to India to visit Vrindavan in Uttar Pradesh. The total number of foreigners infected has now come to four in Mathura district to four, officials said on Monday.

"In RT-PCR test one more foreign national was found to be coronavirus positive on Monday," said Dr. Bhudeo Singh, the incharge of the Rapid Response Team.

Three foreigners hailing from Spain, Switzerland and Austria had covid tested positive on Saturday and Sunday.

All the four were on a fortnight visit to Vrindavan and underwent COVID-19 test before their return journey, officials said.

All the foreigner patients are undergoing treatment and have been kept under isolation. The place where they were staying has been marked as a containment zone, the officials said.

On Sunday, Mathura District Magistrate Navneet Singh Chahal had said an alert has been sounded in the district after the emergence of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 in South Africa and a few other countries.

On Monday, the World Health Organization said that the overall global risk related to the new Omicron has been assessed as "very high".