Senegal has recorded its first case of the omicron variant, becoming the third West African nation to detect the new coronavirus variant after Nigeria and Ghana.
The announcement was made by the Institute for Health Research, Epidemiological Surveillance and Training (IRESSEF), which is one of the laboratories approved by Senegal for COVID-19 testing.
The case was detected Friday from “a 58-year-old man who arrived in Senegal on Monday, Nov. 22, 2021, by flight from a country in the sub-region,” the institute said in a statement Sunday. The man had been vaccinated in April with the AstraZeneca vaccine and in June with Pfizer.
According to the institute, the patient stayed in the capital, Dakar, in a hotel and took part in a demonstration that brought together nearly 300 people of several nationalities. The case has been isolated and as of Sunday did not present symptoms, it said.
Senegal has recorded more than 74,000 coronavirus cases since the pandemic began.
Launched in February, the country’s vaccination campaign has made slow progress, with 1.3 million people inoculated out of a total 17 million population.
