Pauri Garhwal reports first case of Delta Plus AY-12 variant of coronavirus
Pauri Garhwal district in Uttarakhand reported its first case of Delta Plus AY-12 variant of coronavirus on Monday. The case of the Delta Plus AY-12 variant of coronavirus was reported in Kotdwar in Pauri Garhwal. According to the State Health Department, necessary guidelines have been issued and the patient has been quarantined at home. The medical team of the health department is continuously monitoring the patient.
Officials said that relatives and other people who came in contact with the patient are being traced.
With tests also being done at the entry points of the Pauri Garhwal district, a total of 15 new COVID cases have been reported.
Chief Medical Officer, Pauri Dr. Manoj Sharma said, "travel history of the patient of Delta Plus variant of coronavirus is being taken. Along with this, the relatives and other people who came in contact with the patient are being traced."
Meanwhile, the number of Delta Plus variant of coronavirus cases in Rudraprayag district rose to 15 after a fresh case was reported on Monday, said the district health department.
New Covid variant, C.1.2, maybe more infectious: Study
A new variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus which causes COVID-19, has been detected in South Africa and many other countries globally which could be more transmissible and evade protection provided by vaccines, according to a study. Scientists from National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) and the KwaZulu-Natal Research Innovation and Sequencing Platform (KRISP) in South Africa said the potential variant of interest, C.1.2, was first detected in the country in May this year.
C.1.2 has since been found in China, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mauritius, England, New Zealand, Portugal and Switzerland as of August 13, they said.
According to the yet-to-be peer-reviewed study posted on the preprint repository MedRxiv on August 24, C.1.2 has mutated substantially compared to C.1, one of the lineages which dominated the SARS-CoV-2 infections in the first wave in South Africa.
The new variant has more mutations than other variants of concern (VOCs) or variants of interest (VOIs) detected worldwide so far, the researchers said.
They noted that the number of available sequences of C.1.2 may be an underrepresentation of the spread and frequency of the variant in South Africa and around the world.
The study found consistent increases in the number of C.1.2 genomes in South Africa each month, rising from 0.2 per cent of genomes sequenced in May to 1.6 per cent in June and then to 2 per cent in July.
"This is similar to the increases seen with the Beta and Delta variants in the country during early detection," the authors of the study said.
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