Medical intern West Bengal’s 1st Omicron case without international travel history – Times of India

AP photo used for representational purpose only

KOLKATA: A 23-year-old intern of Medical College Hospital Kolkata, who has no recent history of international travel, has tested positive for Omicron.
The young doctor was detected with Covid a week ago and was in home isolation. He was admitted to the Beliaghata ID Hospital late on Friday after his genomesequencing report confirmed Omicron.
Another Omicron case was confirmed on Saturday, that of a 45-year-old-man who flew into the city from Tanzania on Tuesday and was sent for institutional isolation at CNCI Covid Hospital in Rajarhat on testing Covid-positive. This takes the Omicron tally in the state to seven. Five of the Omicron patients are under treatment at different hospitals in the city while two — a seven-year-old boy and a 49-year-old man who had tested positive on arrival at Telangna and New Delhi respectively — have recovered. All the five patients are stable.
The case of the Medical College intern with no travel history has sent alarm bells ringing in the medical fraternity since it may indicate local transmission of the new variant in the state.
“He is a medical professional and might have come in contact with some patients. But without confirmation we can’t say if he had actually come in contact with someone with Omicron. It is too early to conclude about community transmission at this point. Three of his close contacts have been traced,” said Ajay Chakraborty, director of health services.
‘Close contacts of jr doc identified’
According to sources, the intern is an inmate of Dr BC Roy Hostel that houses MBBS students of Medical College. About a week ago, he developed fever, sore throat and cough for which he underwent an RT-PCR test on December 20. When the test threw up a positive result, he left the hostel for his home in Krishnagore and was under home isolation. After health department officials got his Omicron positive report late on Friday night, he was picked up and brought to Beliaghata ID Hospital.
The intern’s sample had been sent to NIBMG Kalyani as part of the protocol to sequence all Covid-positive samples from Kolkata that have a CT value of less than 30 to determine if Omicron transmission is happening in the community. TOI on Thursday had reported that all Covid-positive samples with lower-than-30 CT values are being sent for genome-sequencing.
“This is the first sample with no travel history to test positive for Omicron. We are not pressing the panic button but we will step up surveillance,” said a senior health official.
According to the health officials, exposure to an Omicron-positive patient could be one source of infection for the medical intern who had attended OPD and indoor patient wards on a regular basis before testing Covid-positive. What concerns the officials is that he lived in the hostel and had been in close contact with several MBBS students and interns. Sources at Medical College said some close contacts have been identified and they are not being allowed to move outside their hostel rooms. All of them will undergo Covid tests.
“The condition of the 23-year-old is very stable. Apart from mild symptom like sore throat and issues of anxiety and hypertension he does not have any serious issues as of now. He is under conservative treatment for Covid infection,” said pulmonologist Kausik Chaudhuri, nodal officer for Covid at ID Hospital.