The Ministry of Health of Espírito Santo State confirmed today (22) cases of community transmission of the omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus. Community-based transmission occurs when both the person transmitting the virus and the infected person do not leave the country. It’s the most worrying type of transmission, because it means the virus is already spreading in the country and not just coming from abroad.
The case in Espírito Santo is that of a patient from Vitoria.
The first confirmation of community transmission of omicron in Brazil was confirmed last week in the city of São Paulo. There were two patients who had not traveled outside Brazil and had no contact with anyone who had been abroad.
On Monday (20), the city of Extrema (MG), reported via social networks, that it had detected cases of Omicron infection in the city, also by community transmission, but did not give details of patients and conditions. The state of Minas has not confirmed this information.
“The municipality of Extrema has not yet officially notified the Strategic Information Center in Health Surveillance (CIEVS-MG) of the occurrence of suspected cases of the variant. It is important to emphasize that it is only possible to confirm or exclude the diagnosis after genetic sequencing has been carried out “, said the Ministry of Health of Minas in Memo sent to UOL.
On Tuesday (21), the Rio Grande do Sul Health Department said it was investigating whether community transmission was actually occurring in the state. Among the cases with partial identification of the omicron variant, which still need to be confirmed, there are three cases in which the patient “has no history of travel abroad or recent contact with a person who came from another country”.
A study by the University of Hong Kong Medical School suggests that the new strain may be more transmissible, but cause milder symptoms of the disease.
Recorded UK, omicron has been in community transmission for the longest period More than 100,000 new cases of Covid-19 virus in just one day, the largest number of the entire pandemic in the region.
