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“Present evidence does not suggest that it is ‘XE’ variant of Covid-19,” a source said.
Ishika Yadav | Edited by Aniruddha Dhar
The early evidence doesn’t suggest the presence of Covid-19 ‘XE’ mutant in the country, government sources said on Wednesday, according to news agency ANI, after media reports suggested the first case of the variant had been detected in India.
Read more: Everything you need to know about the XE variant
The government sources said that FastQ files, a text-based format for storing both a biological sequence and its corresponding quality scores, of the sample, being said to be the ‘XE’ variant, was analysed by INSACOG (Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium) which inferred that the genomic constitution of this variant doesn’t correlate with the genomic picture of ‘XE’.
“Present evidence does not suggest that it is ‘XE’ variant of Covid-19,” a source said.
The Greater Mumbai Municipal Corporation had earlier in the day said that “one patient is affected by ‘Kappa’ variant and another by ‘XE’ variant” based on regular testing of samples.
According to the initial reports, India’s first case of the XE variant of the coronavirus disease was reported from Mumbai. The individual who tested positive for the XE variant was a fully vaccinated 50-year-old woman with no comorbidity and asymptomatic, BMC officials said.
The XE variant – hybrid of two sublineages of Omicron (BA.1 and BA.2) was first detected in the UK on January 19. Apart from the UK, cases of the XE variant have also been detected in Thailand and New Zealand.
The XE variant appears to be more transmissible than previous strains of the coronavirus, the WHO said. “Early-day estimates indicate a community growth rate advantage of around 10 per cent “as compared to BA.2,” it added.
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