Health administrators said the center has increased surveillance on the dominant delta variant through sentinel sites, even as it monitors the new mutants. This is even as India’s ‘R’ value, or reproduction number, which represents the virus’s high transmission potential, exceeds 1 in some states.
The Health Ministry said on Tuesday that states like Himachal Pradesh and Punjab have an effective R value of 1.3, which is a matter of concern. Other states with an R value greater than or equal to 1 include Uttar Pradesh (1.1), Andhra Pradesh (1), Gujarat (1.1), Madhya Pradesh (1.1), Goa (1) and Nagaland (1). .
Health Ministry Joint Secretary Lav Agarwal said: “In limited states and limited districts, it was found that the R value was greater than 1, so it is important to take more effective steps in those areas.”
Kerala and Tamil Nadu are among the nine states with 37 districts showing an increasing trend in daily Covid cases over the last two weeks, he said, adding that Kerala has recorded 51.51 per cent of the total infections recorded in India in the last seven days. one week.
sentinel site
Dr SK Singh, director of the National Center for Disease Control, said that it is important to find new mutants and for this purpose, sentinel sites have been identified across the country, and in a fortnight 15 samples have been sent to designated INSACOG (genome sequencing). has been asked to send. ) laboratories.
Sentinel sites are identified from hospitals and laboratories from which random samples are taken over a period of time, and the data are compared over time to take trends or early warnings on existing variants or new variants.
“More than 277 sentinel sites have been identified in the country, with 5 laboratories and 5 tertiary care hospitals in each state.
“All these laboratories have started sending samples from July. Last month, around 8000 samples were sent,” said Singh.
Singh also informed that at present there are 86 cases of Delta Plus variant, with Maharashtra having the maximum number of cases. He further said that two types – kappa and B.1.6.173 – are currently under investigation if they have any public health implications.
“In the period of 4 months since March, no increase was observed in Delta Plus cases and no evidence was found that this virus can increase rapidly in the country,” Singh said.
“Delta version is ruling the world. According to the latest WHO report, its transmission efficiency and attack rate is higher than the alpha version. This virus also increases the cases of hospitalization,” said VK Paul, NITI Aayog, member-health. However, he added that existing vaccines are effective and protect against disease and mortality.
On the need for booster dose, he said that the government is monitoring the situation.