Doctors group announces strike, says India hospitals understaffed for Covid

India reported 9,216 new COVID-19 infections on Friday after announcing its first two Omicron cases the previous day, as groups of resident doctors stayed away from non-critical work to demand new post-graduate students be enrolled to boost staffing.

The country, whose hospitals bore the brunt of a record second surge in infections and deaths in April and May due to the Delta variant, has seen new cases plateauing around 10,000 in the past few weeks.

But the detection of the Omicron variant in the southern state of Karnataka, in one person with no recent travel history, has raised concerns of a third