Devon has received notification of the first confirmed cases of the new Omicron COVID-19 variant within the county.
Steve Brown, Director of Public Health Devon, said:
“We have been informed by the UK Health Security Agency that there are a small number of confirmed cases of Omicron in Devon.
“None of the cases are linked to foreign travel.
“The confirmed cases are isolating at home. All close contacts have been identified and, because their links are to people who have tested positive for Omicron, they have been advised to self-isolate for 10 days, regardless of their vaccination status, and take a PCR test.
“It was only going to be a matter of time before we saw the first Omicron cases in Devon, so this does not come as a surprise. It will take a while before we have real world data to understand the full characteristics of the Omicron variant, but early indicators do seem to suggest that it is more transmissible than the Delta variant.
“We do expect to see the numbers of confirmed Omicron cases rise in Devon over coming weeks, and it is likely to overtake the Delta virus to become the dominant strain across the country.
“We are monitoring the data very closely and will continue to take appropriate measures to curb transmission where we see outbreak situations.”
If you want to know more about the Omicron variant, the UK Health Security Agency has published an interesting blog.