Health authorities in Cyprus began to mull over new possible measures to curb the rapid spread of the “Omicron’ variant warning that these could be announced even before New Year’s eve.
Stricter measures seem inevitable considering the number of positives over the past 24 hours came close to the 1,000 mark with the positivity rate clocking at 1.05 per cent.
Insiders told Philenews an emergency meeting of the Covid-19 Advisory Committee with Health Minister Michalis Hadjipantelas is not ruled out.
Hadjipandelas said on Thursday: “We will study the data in coming days and if we need to take additional measures, we will take them after consulting the scientists.”
At the same time, health experts admit the situation is worrisome.
Dr. Michalis Voniatis referred to possible bleak scenario of even 2,000 cases per day in the coming weeks if “Omicron” is allowed to “invade” the community.
And Dr. Leontios Kostrikis predicts that by the end of the year 90% of the new cases will be from the new variant.
