Samoa's director-general of health Dr Take Naseri. Photo / Samoa Govt
From RNZ
Ten new cases of Covid-19 have been confirmed in Samoa among passengers who arrived in the country from Australia on Wednesday.
Samoa's director-general of health Dr Take Naseri confirmed the cases, which include an 11-month-old baby, during a press conference yesterday in Apia.
The passengers were on a flight from Brisbane carrying 73 people.
All are fully vaccinated and had tested negative for Covid-19 before departure.
The new cases are Samoa's largest group on one flight since the start of the pandemic.
Naseri said all of the passengers who tested positive since arriving in Samoa have been put into isolation and all are asymptomatic.
Naseri said test samples will be sent to New Zealand on the first available flight to determine which variant of Covid-19 they are dealing with.
But he said given the situation in Australia they suspect it is the Omicron variant.
Meanwhile, the chairman of the National Emergency Operation Centre, Agafili Shem Leo, has urged those who have tested positive not to panic and to heed all conditions of their isolation.
He said they are hoping there has been no community transmission but they are prepared to quickly move up alert levels if need be.
He also announced that a planned repatriation flight from New Zealand due to depart on Saturday will now be postponed until further notice.
Ukraine this week fired the Storm Shadow weapons into Russia for the first time.