The State on Friday recorded 96 new double mutant (B.1.617) cases taking the total number of cases with this strain to 244. This is apart from the 109 U.K. strain and six South African strain cases reported so far.
V. Ravi, nodal officer for genomic confirmation of SARS-CoV-2 in Karnataka, told The Hindu that 82.9% of the new variant cases are from Bengaluru Urban.
“Of the total 359 new variant cases in Karnataka, 11.5% are U.K. variant, 0.6% South Africa, and 10% B.1.617 more popularly known as double mutant. The double mutant has two groups – B.1.617.1 and B.1.617.2 – and the latter group is spreading at a rapid pace contributing over 16% of the total new variants in Bengaluru,” he said. This variant is slowly taking over and replacing other circulating strains in many of the Southern States in the past four weeks. It is one of the main reasons for the ongoing surge in Karnataka, he said.
Detected first in India, the double mutant COVID-19 variant B.1.617 has been reported in 44 countries now. It is spreading fast across the UK and has caused concern. Therefore, the Public Health England has declared and World Health Organisation has declared it as a Variant of Concern.
Meanwhile, Karnataka on Friday reported 32,218 new cases of COVID-19, taking the total to 23,67,742. Of these, 9,591 cases are from Bengaluru Urban. With 353 deaths, the toll rose to 24,207. This is apart from 20 deaths of patients due to non-COVID-19 reasons.
As many as 52,581 persons were discharged on Friday, taking the total recoveries to 18,29,276. The State now has 5,14,238 active patients.
While the positivity rate for the day stood at 24.22%, the Case Fatality Rate (CFR) touched 1.09%.
As many as 1,33,013 tests were conducted in the last 24 hours, including 1,17,427 RT-PCR tests. With this, the total number of tests rose to 2,84,53,442.
Meanwhile, vaccination for the 18-44 age group that had been stopped from May 14 in all government vaccination centres will resume for frontline workers from Saturday.
