Six People In South Sulawesi Positive For COVID-19 Variant Omicron

The North Luwu Health Office carries out vaccination activities to prevent the spread of COVID-19. ANTARA/HO- Lutra Task Force

MAKASSAR - The South Sulawesi Provincial Health Office reported that as many as six people in the area were confirmed positive for the Omicron variant of COVID-19.

The six new suspected Omicron patients, each with the initials MNS and AKA from Soppeng Regency, AC from Luwu, AAW from Barru Regency, CP from Sidoarjo Regency, East Java and H from Jakarta.

"We have sent samples of the suspected people to the center for examination and the results have been found to be positive for Omicron," said Head of the South Sulawesi Health Office, Dr. Arman Bausat, in Makassar, as reported by Antara, Wednesday, February 9.

With the addition of these six positive omicrons, the total is seven people. Omicron's first patient was from Takalar and was declared dead yesterday.

He explained that the certainty of people suspected of being infected with Omicron takes longer. This is because each sample must be sent to Jakarta due to the absence of Omicron detection equipment in South Sulawesi.

South Sulawesi itself, he said, only had assistance from the Ministry of Health, which was only able to detect probable Omicron samples, so they had to be sent to Jakarta to be sure.

"So the probable Omicron sample that we got, we have to send it again and of course it takes time. Moreover, in Jakarta we also have to queue because every region sends samples there," he explained.

The South Sulawesi COVID-19 Task Force is now conducting a close contact tracing of the seven residents who were confirmed to be Omicron.

In addition, as of February 7, 2022, there were 81 new cases added so that there were 714 active positive cases or 0.64 percent, a cure rate of 97.33 percent and a death rate of 2.03 percent.