The Union Home Secretary chaired an urgent meeting to discuss the new COVID Variant of Concern ‘Omicron’ and decided that the central government will review the Standard Operating Procedure on testing and surveillance of incoming international passengers, especially for those countries identified ‘at risk’ category.
Notably, the Centre on November 26 announced to resume regular international flights from December 15 except for 14 countries.
Union Home Secretary held the high-level meeting with Dr V K Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog, Dr Vijay Raghavan, Principal Scientific Adviser to Prime Minister and senior officers from Health, Civil Aviation and other ministries.
During the meeting, it was decided that a closer watch on the emerging COVID pandemic situation within the country will be maintained.
The high-ranking government also deliberated on the overall global situation in wake of the Omicron virus. Various preventive measures in place and to be further strengthened were discussed in the meeting.
In view of the threat posed by the new COVID variant Omicron, it was decided that the genomic surveillance for variants to be further strengthened and intensified.
Airport Health Officials (APHOs) and Port Health Officials (PHOs) to be sensitized for strict supervision of testing protocol at airports/ports, the union home ministry said.
Earlier, the central government today wrote to the states and UTs over the possible threat of new Covid variant B.1.1.529 and urged them to do rigorous surveillance of international passengers.
“ln view of the possible threat that this VoC can pose to the nation, it is imperative that the intensive containment, active surveillance, increased coverage of vaccination and Covid Appropriate Behaviour must be enforced in the field in a very proactive manner to effectively manage this VoC”, said the letter to the states and UTs.
