Toronto Public Health confirms first three cases of Omicron variant in city
TORONTO – While testing for an entirely new strain of coronavirus has become a hot topic on the city’s social media accounts as of late, there is still one other strain of coronavirus that has not been reported so far, and that is the Omicron variant.
Since late last week, there have been several cases of Omicron variant, though none of them have been in Toronto.
On Monday, Toronto Public Health said in a statement that, “there have been three presumptive positive cases of coronavirus (2019-nCoV) that have been confirmed by Toronto Public Health (TPH) in the past two days.”
They said that none of the cases have “been associated with travel to, from or within China.”
“This confirms Toronto Public Health’s current knowledge that the first case of community transmission of the virus was likely linked to exposure in the general population and is currently being investigated. Our priority remains to test individuals in the community who have travelled or stayed in China within the last seven days and who were not symptomatic,” the statement reads.
Earlier this week, TPH said that there had been two presumptive positive cases of the virus, and that they did not have testing kits in all areas.
Toronto Public Health told CP24 later on Monday that they may have “missed” a previously unknown case.
“If that happens, we will be doing more testing. We are asking people who have travelled to Wuhan, China, and have returned to Canada within the last seven days to consider testing and also to call the Toronto Public Health Laboratory to get a test done as soon as possible,” the statement read.
“As we learn more about our investigation of this novel virus, we will make decisions on how we will move forward with our response.”
In late March, Toronto Public Health confirmed that one person in the city had been diagnosed with coronavirus and in that case, he had travelled back to China from France.
