New Delhi: India is expected to register about 5 lakh cases during the peak, which is likely to come in February, said an American health expert.
Calling Omicron less severe, Director from Institute for Health Metrics & Evaluation, Washington Dr Christopher Murray said it will lead to less hospitalization and deaths compared to the Delta variant.
Experts across the world have different views about the Omicron variant, with World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus saying that the Omicron variant of COVID-19 appears to be a less severe disease than the Delta strain, but it does not mean it should be categorized as“mild”.
Saying that the Omicron variant is hospitalizing and killing people, just like previous ones, Dr Tedros said that the tsunami of cases is so huge and quick, that it is overwhelming health systems around the world.
“Hospitals are becoming overcrowded and understaffed, which further results in preventable deaths from not only COVID-19 but other diseases and injuries where patients cannot receive timely care,” he added.
India is witnessing the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic and there will be an upward curve of the number of cases, and then it will gradually go down.
“The severity of the disease when compared to the second wave, it is clinically less severe. So far we can see, patients recover in five-six days,” an Indian health expert told ANI.
The symptoms are just like flu such as fever and weakness, Dr Rupali Basu, MD and CEO, Woodlands Hospital, Kolkata said. Loss of smell and taste might have in some patients, she added. India reported 1,17,100 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, taking the daily positivity rate in the country to 7.74 per cent, said the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Friday. With this, the country’s COVID-19 case tally has gone up to 3,52,26,386.
As the Omicron-triggered third Covid wave enters a key phase, a new projection by researchers at the Indian Institute of Science and Indian Statistical Institute (IISc-ISI) claims that the country is likely to witness over 10 lakh Covid cases a day at January-end/beginning of February when the third wave meets its peak.
The Omicron 'Projections January-March 2022 IISC-ISI Model' by Professor Siva Athreya, Professor Rajesh Sundaresan and the team from the Center for Networked Intelligence at IISC-ISI in Bengaluru predicts that the third Covid wave may peak in January-end and early-February, with daily cases touching 10 lakh.
The peak of the third wave will vary for different states, and the Covid-19 curve for India could start flattening by March-beginning.
"Past infection, vaccination affected by immunity waning makes a certain fraction of the population susceptible to the new variant," said the IISc-ISI model. The model offers data on three levels of susceptibility -- 30 per cent, 60 per cent and 100 per cent.
Under the 30 percent susceptibility criteria, India could see 3 lakhs cases per day, 6 lakh cases per day under 60 per cent susceptibility, and 10 lakh cases at 100 per cent susceptibility.
Maharashtra could be the worst-hit, likely to experience over 175,000 daily cases at its peak (at 100 percent susceptibility).
Maharashtra's single-day Covid-19 caseload shot above the 40,000-mark on Friday. For the 11th consecutive day, the state reported a massive spike in Covid-19 infections and suspect cases whose samples have been sent for genome sequencing. According to the model, Kerala and Tamil Nadu may witness one lakh and over 80,000 daily cases respectively, around the beginning of February. Delhi is likely to see almost 70,000 daily cases by the end of January, according to the IISC-ISI model. Last month, researchers from IIT Kanpur (IIT-K) also predicted that a third wave of the Covid-19 pandemic may peak in India by February 3.
A report, published in the online preprint health server MedRxiv, said: "Following the trends around the world, this project report forecasts India's third wave may start around mid-December and peak in the beginning of February."
The research report used the data of the first and second waves in India, and the current rise in cases triggered by Omicron in various countries, to predict a possible third wave in the country.
India's daily number of cases crossed the one-lakh mark as the country registered 1,17,100 new cases of Covid-19 in the last 24 hours.
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