NEW DELHI: The genome sequencing of the samples of persons infected with the UK variant of SARS-CoV-2 in India has revealed that the mutations in it do not push the patients towards the severity of Covid-19 disease or enhance the transmissibility, so far.

in addition, the symptoms that arrived with the contraction of the specific variant was also found analogous to variant circulating in the country, top officials at National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) said.

Dr Sujeet Kumar Singh, Director, NCDC, said that the UK strain was found with at least 70 percent enhanced transmissibility in European nations, however, such a case has not been detected in India so far. "In contrast to the situation in Europe, we have found no spike in the UK strain among the people infected here or the enhanced rate of transmission. The spread here was not found as expeditious as it was detected elsewhere,"

He also said, the symptoms of the UK variant are similar to the common strain circulating in India and in other parts of the world. "As of now, there is no evidence that the symptoms from the UK strain push towards the severity of the illness or are distinct in nature compared to the common strains," he said. 

NCDC is the nodal agency in the country for disease surveillance facilitating prevention and control of communicable diseases.

Dr Suresh Kumar, Director, Delhi government-run Lok Nayak Hospital, the only facility in the national capital where the patients of the UK variant are treated, told IANS that most of them had mild symptoms of the disease such as low-grade fever and cough. However, a few needed ICU assistance as well.

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