The Covid-19 case that was reported in Mumbai a few days ago has been confirmed as the new XE variant, said BMC on Saturday.
A 67-year-old man who had traveled to Vadodara tested positive for Covid on 11 March in a hotel. As he was asymptomatic, he returned back to Mumbai. His results were sent to genome sequencing, after which it was found that the fully vaccinated man has the XE variant of Covid-19.
BMC officials said that the man is now completely stable, and has no symptoms.
Gujarat's Vadodara also reported its first XE variant case on Saturday.
Officials said that the XE mutant appears to be 10 percent more transmissible than the BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron. So far, BA.2 was deemed to be the most contagious of all the COVID-19 variants.
The XE variant is a mutation of the BA.1 and BA.2 Omicron strains, referred to as a "recombinant”. As per the initial studies, the XE variant has a growth rate of 9.8 percent over that of BA.2, also known as the stealth variant because of its ability to evade detection.
The World Health Organization has said the latest mutant may be more transmissible than the previous ones.
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