Ministers exhort vaccination, masks as Omicron cases rise

ISLAMABAD: Federal ministers on Wednesday urged Pakistanis to get vaccinated and revisit mask-wearing, as the cases of the new coronavirus variant, Omicron, have started spreading rapidly in the country.

Major cities have started reporting hundreds of cases of the new variant, which was first detected in the country on December 13 in Karachi. Lahore has a total of 170 Omicron cases and Islamabad 141 to date.

"Omicron spreads at a fast pace, but it isn't lethal [...] however, do not think that nothing will happen to you if you get infected with the Omicron variant," National Command and Operations Centre (NCOC) chief Asad Umar said.

The federal minister for planning, development and special initiatives said that in the United States and the United Kingdom, the variant was not proving to be as lethal as previous ones, as their vaccination rate was high.

"In the United States, after Omicron was detected, the cases rose by 400 percent and the hospitalisations went up by 92%. In the United Kingdom, cases moved up by almost 300% and hospitalisations 134 percent."

The federal minister said the major difference between South Africa — where the variant first emerged and wreaked havoc — and the other two countries was that their rate of vaccination was much higher.

"So to save yourselves from coronavirus, get vaccinated," the federal minister said, as he rubbished claims that vaccines do not work against Omicron. The federal minister said children under 14 years also got infected with the virus and urged that they should be vaccinated as well.