Nagpur: India on Wednesday reported its very first case of the Covid-19 XE Variant in Mumbai, as per the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).
In the media release, the civic body also said that a case of Kappa variant has also been recorded in the city. It added that the patients detected with the variants do not have any severe symptoms as now. However, as per the World Health Organisation (WHO), it is said that the new mutant may be more transmissible than any other strain of the novel coronavirus.
The union health ministry disagreed saying the present evidence does not suggest that it is XE Variant. The patient is said to have foreign travel history and had put the patient’s sample for genome sequencing along with 230 other samples.
Maharashtra Health minister Rajesh Tope while addressing the media said that as per the information, the XE variant is 10 per cent more infectious than the Omicron variant.
Tope also added that the health department has not received any confirmation on the XE variant as there is no NIB (National Institute of Biologicals) report yet. “There’s no need to panic,” he said.
The Mumbai patient is a 50-year-old costume designer who returned from South Africa in February. She tested positive for Covid on March 2, the BMC said in its release.
