NCOC urges provinces to expedite Covid vaccination drive amid Omicron threat

ISLAMABAD: National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) on Thursday urged provinces to speed up the vaccination process amid rising trend of Omicron variant, a new heavily mutated Covid-19 strain, ARY News reported.

The forum discussed the epidemic curve chart data, national vaccine strategy and disease prevalence across the country. The NCOC was briefed about COVID positivity ratio, disease prevalence, number of deaths and new admissions.

The forum discussed in detail the city-wise Covid-19 vaccination process and agreed upon taking strict measures regarding obligatory vaccination regime.

Also Read: NCOC expands testing capacity in high-risk areas amid Omicron outbreak

The meeting also discussed the total number of vaccine administration, procurement and balance of vaccines. “Vaccination is the only way to prevent the spread of new Covid variant,” the forum noted.

National Command and Operation Centre also discussed the current status of oxygen production and distribution process across the country.

The National Command and Operations Centre on Monday had decided to expand testing capacity in the high-risk areas of the country amid the outbreak of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.

Addressing a press conference in Islamabad along with the SAPM, Dr Faisal Sultan, NCOC chief Asad Umar had said that the South African variant of the pandemic is most dangerous as compared to earlier ones.

Pakistan Covid cases

As many as 377 new cases of Covid-19 were reported in Pakistan in the last 24 hours, taking the infection tally to 1,285,431.

According to the National Command and Operation Centre’s (NCOC) data, a total of 44,137 samples were tested, out of which 377 turned out to be positive, showing the positivity rate of 0.85 per cent, a little lower than yesterday’s 0.97 per cent.

Eight more people died of the viral disease during the past 24 hours, pushing the death toll to 28,745. The number of critical Covid-19 patients in various hospitals across the country has come down to 904.