Ten COVID-19 clusters, including major ones at the National Institute of Technology (NIT-C), the Indian Institute of Management (IIM-K), and a private institution at Kattippara, have been reported in Kozhikode district till Saturday.
Meanwhile, 12 persons were reported to have the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 here, of whom eight got it through contact.
According to senior Health Department officials, over 100 persons have been found to be infected at these three institutions, which are shut now. Seventy persons contracted the infection at IIM-K, an official said. The students at the IIM and the NIT have been quarantined at the hostels.
Meanwhile, one of the infected persons at the IIM is reported to have the Omicron variant. One of the hostels on the NIT campus has been converted into a first-line treatment centre, where infected persons from other places in the district will be admitted.
It is learnt that students at the NIT have been told to vacate their hostels by January 21 in the wake of the surge in cases. Final-year and third-year undergraduate students were having offline classes and the plan was to have it for second-year students from January 18. In view of the current situation, only postgraduate and PhD students may have offline classes. The move to vacate students from other parts of the country is likely to create a problem for them. Entry and exit have been completely restricted at the IIM-K. Special testing camps are being held at both the institutions at present.
As many as 1,648 people tested positive for the virus on Saturday. As many as 6,113 samples were tested and the daily test positivity rate is 27.74%. The number of active cases rose to 9,337. Ninety-seven people are in government hospitals and 197 in private hospitals. A total of 7,337 are in home isolation.
