The health authorities will know in the coming days whether the recent increase in Covid-19 cases was caused by the Omicron variant, Health Superintendent Charmaine Gauci said.

Speaking to Times of Malta, Gauci explained that the genome sequencing – a process that determines which strain of Covid a positive case is infected with – takes up to five days.

She said that Omicron was not detected in results obtained Sunday, from samples taken five days previous.

“However, as we have been seeing all over Europe and outside, the expectation is that Omicron will be detected very soon. Also according to the World Health Organisation, Omicron will start replacing Delta as the dominant variant because of the high transmission rate.”

Omicron has so far been detected in 89 countries.

Asked if the recent spike could be caused by an as-of-yet undetected Omicron variant, Gauci said this will be confirmed in the coming days, when the results from samples taken from the past few days are out.

“The increase has happened over the past few days. The reason for the increase could be that we could have Omicron and we would know better and confirm by further sequencing.”

Gauci said the increase could also be the result of social gatherings, something which has already been experienced in the past.

The most common source of infection now is related to households, she said. Several other cases are related to social and work gatherings, as well as to worlplaces, particularly places where social distancing is not followed and people do not wear masks.

Asked if people should be prepared for more restrictions, Gauci said the authorities are closely monitoring the situation, particularly at the hospitals, but noted that several mitigation measures remain in place.

She said the majority of new cases are in the 24-49 age group. “What is positive is that the rollout of the booster is moving very fast, and we have now started giving the vaccine to people aged over 35. We expect the rollout in for this cohort to move fast.”

The health authorities reported 252 new cases on Monday, with hospitalisations now rising to 42.