Staff Correspondent
The variant was detected from a sample collected at a Dhaka hospital, says the IEDCR
Bangladesh has detected its first case of a highly infectious coronavirus variant first identified in India, says the Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research (IEDCR).
The variant has been detected from a sample collected at the Evercare Hospital in capital Dhaka and it has been published on Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID), said Dr Tahmina Shirin, director of the government’s disease control agency.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has described it as a “variant of interest,” suggesting it may have mutations that would make the virus more transmissible, cause more severe disease or evade vaccine immunity.
Earlier on May 3, Director General of Health Services (DGHS) said that the government will be confirmed within a few days whether the highly contagious Indian variant of coronavirus has already reached Bangladesh as an investigation is going on in this regard.
Speaking at a virtual press briefing, DGHS spokesperson Dr Nazmul Islam, said: “We may be able to say it in a few days whether the Indian strain of Covid-19 has come to Bangladesh or not.”
He said the samples of those who tested positive for coronavirus after entering Bangladesh from India are being collected. “These samples are being sent for genome sequencing…we’ll share it with you [media] immediately after receiving the report.”
India’s crematoriums and burial grounds are being overwhelmed by the devastating new surge of infections tearing through the populous country with terrifying speed, depleting the supply of life-saving oxygen to critical levels and leaving patients to die while waiting in line to see doctors, reports UNB via AP.
India recorded over 400,000 new Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours ending 8am Saturday, taking the country’s total caseload to over 21.9 million. Out of these, over 3,700,000 cases are currently active while over 17.9 million people have recovered.
With 4,187 new deaths, the toll now stands at over 238,000. At least 14 states are reporting cases in five figures. Maharashtra reported about 54,000 cases, Karnataka had nearly 49,000, while Kerala had over 38,000.
It was on March 8, last year, when health authorities in Bangladesh reported the first three cases of Covid-19, a severe acute respiratory illness caused by a new coronavirus strain which was later named Sars-CoV-2.
Since then, till Saturday morning, the country reported total Covid 11,878 deaths and 772,127 cases.
On March 8, health authorities in Bangladesh reported the first three cases of Covid-19, a severe acute respiratory illness caused by a new coronavirus strain which was later named Sars-CoV-2.
The novel coronavirus broke out in China’s Wuhan city in late December, 2019 and quickly spread throughout the world, becoming a pandemic in less than three months.
The fast-spreading coronavirus has claimed more than 3,286,000 lives and infected as many as 157,627,000 people across the world till Saturday afternoon, according to worldometer.
As many as 135,105,000 people have recovered from Covid-19, which has affected 219 countries and territories across the planet.
