Coronavirus | 20 found with mutant variant of SARS- CoV-2 virus reported from U.K.: Health Ministry

The Health Ministry said that apart from the six found positive on Tuesday these cases were reported in Delhi and Bengaluru.

Municipal workers in personal protective equipment look on as passengers from United Kingdom arrive at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, in Mumbai on December 22, 2020.

A total of 20 persons (14 on Wednesday) have been found with the mutant variant of SARS- CoV-2 virus reported from the United Kingdom, the Health Ministry confirmed on Wednesday.

These include the six persons reported earlier (three in NIMHANS, Bengaluru, two in CCMB, Hyderabad, and one in NIV, Pune). In all, 107 samples were tested in 10 labs.

“The Central government has constituted the INSACOG (Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium) comprising 10 labs (NIBMG Kolkata, ILS Bhubaneswar, NIV Pune, CCS Pune, CCMB Hyderabad, CDFD Hyderabad, InSTEM Bengaluru, NIMHANS Bengaluru, IGIB Delhi, NCDC Delhi) for genome sequencing. The situation is under careful watch, and regular advice is being provided to the States for enhanced surveillance, containment, testing and dispatch of samples to the INSACOG labs,” said the Health Ministry.

High recovery rate

Releasing the daily COVID-19 update, the Ministry said that the daily recoveries had outnumbered the daily new cases since the last 33 days successively. In the last 24 hours, 20,549 persons were found to be COVID-19 positive in the country. During the same period, 26,572 new recoveries were reported, registering a drop in the active caseload.

According to data released by the Ministry, the country’s cumulative recoveries stand at 98,34,141 — this is the highest globally. The recovery rate has also reached nearly 96% (95.99%) and the gap between recoveries and active cases is consistently widening (95,71,869).

Of the new recovered cases, 78.44% are observed to be concentrated in 10 States/Union Territories with Maharashtra reporting the maximum number of single day recoveries with 5,572 newly recovered cases. 5,029 people recovered in Kerala followed by 1,607 in Chhattisgarh. This when 79.24% of the new cases are from 10 States and UTs.

Kerala reported the highest daily new cases at 5,887 followed by Maharashtra with 3,018 and West Bengal 1,244.

India also reported 286 case fatalities in the past 24 hours. “Ten States/UTs account for 79.37% of the new deaths where Maharashtra saw the maximum casualties (68), West Bengal and Delhi follow with 30 and 28 daily deaths, respectively,” said the Ministry.