Rajasthan government decides to step up genome sequencing to track Covid variants

JAIPUR: A day after the Centre asked people to follow Covid-appropriate behaviour following spurt in cases in China, Japan, US, Korea and Brazil, the state has decided to focus more on genome sequencing to monitor variants. Rajasthan has witnessed five Covid cases and no death in the last 24 hours.
Former health minister and BJP leader Kalicharan Saraf demanded from the Centre to suspend flights between China and India. He has written a letter to Union civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia.
Saraf said, “Not only cases have increased, but also the deaths are happening due to Covid in China. They are facing shortage of beds and scarcity of medicines. The international flight service is continuing between India and China. In such a situation when people from China are coming to India, we are facing risk of spread of virus in our country.”
Besides, in a presentation, union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya who was chairing a high-level meeting to review the Covid-19 situation on Wednesday, was briefed that a new and highly transmissible BF.7 strain of the Omicron variant has been found to be behind a wider surge of Covid infections in China.
The high-level meeting was held a day after ministry of health secretary Rajesh Bhushan wrote to the states to gear up the whole genome sequencing of positive case samples to track the variants.
However, state’s health department officials claimed that they have been conducting genome sequencing to track new variants. “We have facilities in medical colleges of Jaipur and Jodhpur for genome sequencing. We have been doing it and now since the Centre has given instructions, we will step up genome sequencing in the state,” he said.
Regarding new and highly transmissible BF.7 strain of the Omicron variant, he said, “No case of BF.7 strain has been detected in the state so far. But, we are alert as some countries are witnessing spike in Covid cases.”
In the state, the current situation is not a worry for the health authorities as just five cases of Covid-19 were reported from across the state in past 24 hours, no death was reported. The state has 52 active cases. After the alert from the Centre, the health authorities have started preparing report on daily bed occupancy of Covid-19 patients in the hospital and strengthening surveillance, while focusing on five-fold strategy of test-track-treat-vaccination and adherence to Covid-19 appropriate behaviour for restricting the transmission of Covid virus.