Russia nears 100,000 daily infections as omicron rages

MOSCOW (AP) — Russian authorities on Friday reported over 98,000 new confirmed coronavirus cases, but according to the Kremlin, the actual number is likely to be much higher as the highly contagious omicron variant continues to rage through the vast country.

Russia's state coronavirus task force on Friday registered 98,040 new infections tallied over the past 24 hours — another all-time high for the country that in recent weeks has faced its biggest surge of contagions in the pandemic.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Friday that “it is obvious that this number is higher and possibly much higher,” because “many people don't get tested” and have no symptoms. Peskov noted that Russia's numbers are “so far lower than in Western European countries, than in the U.S., so one can't rule out that they will grow further.”

The Kremlin spokesman also admitted that a lot of people in the presidential administration have gotten infected with the virus. “The vast majority continue to work from home after having isolated themselves,” Peskov said. “This explosive contagiousness of the omicron, it demonstrates itself in full.”

Coronavirus infections in Russia started to soar nearly three weeks ago, with daily tallies of new cases spiking from about 15,000 on Jan. 10 to almost 100,000 on Friday. Russian authorities, however, have avoided imposing any major restrictions to stem the surge, saying the health system has been coping with the influx of patients.

Peskov said Friday there was no point in imposing “excessive restrictions" and cited “the world's experience.”

Earlier this month, parliament indefinitely postponed introducing restrictions on the unvaccinated that would have proven unpopular among vaccine-hesitant Russians. And this week health officials cut the...