As per a health department official, Mizoram is still clear of the Omicron variation of COVID-19, since two foreign returnees whose samples were sent for genome sequencing proved negative for the highly transmissible new variant.

Dr. Pachuau Lalmalsawma, state nodal officer of the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) and official spokesperson on COVID-19, stated the two returnees arrived lately from Australia and Singapore. They were diagnosed with COVID-19 upon arrival at Aizawl's Lengpui airport, and their samples were transferred to the National Institute of Biomedical Genomics in Kalyani, West Bengal, for genome sequencing on December 22.

On Monday, he claimed, the two samples tested negative for Omicron. Pachuau further asked individuals to follow Covid-19 Appropriate Behaviour (CAB) to the letter, especially during the Christmas season, because new COVID-19 variations such as Delta and other variants are still circulating in the state.

So far, at least four new COVID-19 variants have been discovered in the state, including Delta, Delta Plus, Alpha, and Beta. Meanwhile, the health department in the northeastern state recorded 184 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, bringing the total number of cases in the state to 1,40,748, according to the health department.

The death toll has remained at 539, with no new deaths reported in the previous 24 hours. It said Khawzawl district had the most new cases, with 44, followed by Aizawl district (41) and Mamit district (31). The single-day positive rate fell to 10.27 percent from 10.45 percent the day before.

There are now 1,435 active cases, with 148 people recovering from the virus on Monday, bringing the overall number of recoveries to 1,38,744. COVID-19 patients have a recovery rate of 98.57 percent and a mortality rate of 0.38 percent. More than 14.99 lakh samples have been tested for COVID-19 in the state so far, with 1,792 samples tested on Monday. According to state immunisation officer Dr. Lalzawmi, over 7.29 lakh persons have been inoculated, with 5.87 lakh receiving the full dosage.

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