Russia on brink of new outbreaks of coronavirus infections - Putin

MOSCOW. Jan 12 (Interfax) - Russia is on the brink of new outbreaks of coronavirus infections, President Vladimir Putin said.

"Obviously, we have found ourselves in an extremely difficult situation, we are on the brink of new possible outbreaks, especially as the holidays have been long and communication between people has been very intensive in that period. This cannot help but affect the epidemiological situation in the country," Putin said at a meeting with government members.

The entire world has been struggling with Covid-19, Putin said.

"We can see what's going on in the United States, which reports over 1 million cases per day. That's incredible. I think they have already reported 1.3 million cases. About the same is happening in European countries because of the new Omicron variant. This is yet another proof that we have done right by sending teams of our specialists to South Africa," he said.

Putin thanked the South African president for the opportunity to "work" with Omicron at the place of its origin. "Hopefully, this will give us some advantage from the angle of timely adoption of necessary decisions," he said.