Omicron community transmission found happening in Baguio before Christmas

Baguio City, Philippines – Based on the two cases of omicron infection in the city, the data revealed that the Omicron variant has already cases of community transmission in the city even before December 14, last year.

One of the city’s COVID-19 patients whose specimen collected on December 14 turned out to have been infected with the omicron variant according to a result of genome sequencing that came out on January 15.

Mayor Benjamin Magalong said that this means the omicron variant has already been circulating in the city before Christmas considering that the patient has no outside travel record 14 days before swab testing.

“The [Omicron] variant has been here before December 14. That means we already had community transmission before Christmas,” Magalong said in an interview with the media on Jan. 17.

The other patient, who came out positive for the omicron variant on January 15 after undergoing testing on December 22 also has no travel history.

Magalong, as reported by the Public Information Office-Baguio City, said they have conducted “a back-contact tracing and link analysis to determine circumstances of the patients and possibly provide a clue where the infection originated to guide the city in its preventive measures.”

Baguio began totaling a record-high infection rate on January 13, with 516 new cases, and on January 18, with 646 new cases.

As of Sunday, January 23, the city recorded 251 new cases and two deaths.

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