It goes up to 34 cases associated with omicron in Portugal
The number of covid-19 cases associated with the omicron variant rose to 34. The number is advanced in the report of the “red lines” of the General Directorate of Health (DGS) and the National Institute Dr. Ricardo Jorge (INSA).
“With regard to the omicron variant, at 6 pm today [sexta-feira], identified a total of 34 cases”, the document reads. The two entities state that of the 34 cases, 28 are associated with the outbreak in the B-SAD football team, five were detected in the Center region and one case in Lisbon and Vale of the Tagus.
The National Institute Dr. Ricardo Jorge needs, this Friday, that those infected are asymptomatic or “mild associates, with no hospitalizations or deaths having occurred”.
Cases 34 were identified as “specific mutations, strong predictors of the omicron variant”. However, there are hypotheses in which “the result of the identification of the variant” is awaited.
In a last sample, “relating to the period from 15 to 21 November”, “no case of this variant was detected in the weekly random samplings”, explains the INSA. The delta variant continues to be the most prevalent in Portugal, currently circulating multiple averages, including AY.4.2 and AY.43.
Children under 10 are the age group with the highest cumulative increase to 14 days (597 cases per 100,000 population), but the increase in cases is increasing at all ages. Those over 80 years of age registered 172 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, which “reports a lower risk of infection than that presented by the general population”.
All regions of the country have an Rt (transmissibility index) above 1, “indicating an increasing trend in the incidence of infection” by SARS-CoV-2.
Bed occupancy in intensive care units rose to 50%, with 128 patients admitted on 1 December. “The Algarve and Centro regions have an occupation as a percentage of the alert level above 70%”, report the DGS and the INSA.
Portugal recorded, this Friday, 21 deaths by covid-19, the highest number since March 18.