51 Delta plus cases across 12 states, 2 in Punjab, 1 Haryana

Tribune News Service
New Delhi/Chandigarh, June 25

Punjab’s Ludhiana and Patiala districts, Faridabad in Haryana and Katra in Jamp;K have reported their first cases of the highly transmissible Delta plus variant. In all, 51 cases have been reported across 12 states, the maximum 22 in Maharashtra.

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The Centre on Friday urged states and UTs to take up immediate containment measures, including preventing crowds, conducting widespread testing and increasing vaccine coverage on a priority basis in districts where the Delta plus variant had been detected. The measures were suggested by Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan in a letter to the chief secretaries of Punjab, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat.

Cases in Patiala and Ludhiana, Punjab alerted

Chandigarh: With Punjab reporting first two cases of the Delta plus variant in Patiala and Ludhiana districts, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan has, in a letter to state’s Chief Secretary Vini Mahajan, asked the state to take up immediate containment measures as the variant was highly transmissible. The Centre has also suggested sending adequate samples to the designated INSACOG laboratories for genome sequencing.

Sujeet Singh, National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) Director, said 22 had been found in Maharashtra, nine in Tamil Nadu, seven in MP, three in Kerala, two each in Punjab and Gujarat, and one each in Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Jamp;K, Haryana and Karnataka. The cases have been found in 45,000 samples sequenced so far.

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The Delta variant of concern, meanwhile, has emerged as the dominant Covid mutation circulating in India with presence in a whopping 80 per cent of the samples genome sequenced so far to study viral mutations. Of the 21,109 variants of concern detected in India after studying 65,000 samples until now, 16,238 are Delta, first detected in Maharashtra last year and now present in 80 countries.

“Delta is a stronger variant than B117, first detected in the UK. Among all variants of concern found in India, Alpha (B117) accounts for 3,969 cases, Beta (detected in South Africa) 149 and Gamma (detected in Brazil) one case. We have found 48 cases of the Delta plus mutation and are studying them for public health implications,” National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) Director SK Singh said today.

The NCDC data shows the Delta variant spread across 174 districts in 35 states with the highest numbers reported from districts in Maharashtra, Delhi, Kerala, Punjab, Telangana, Bengal and Gujarat. Of the 21,109 variants of concern, Maharashtra has highest 3,117, Delhi 2,973, Kerala 2,382 and Punjab 1,431.

The NCDC chief said even the proportion of cases with variants of concern in India had risen from 10.31 per cent in May to 51 per cent on June 20. The spread of Delta in India has been dramatic—from presence in one district in late December 2020 to 52 districts in late March and 174 today.

Although overall the second wave was receding and 565 districts today had below 5 per cent positivity rate, ICMR chief Balram Bhargava said 74 districts still had over 10% positivity rate and 92 districts had 5 to 10% positivity. “States must impose strict restrictions wherever case positivity is above 5%,” he said.