India says 'no need for panic', hasn't found new strain of coronavirus

The new more transmissible strain of the coronavirus detected in Britain has not yet been found in India, a senior government official said on Tuesday, as health authorities prepared to screen all passengers arriving from the United Kingdom since Nov. 25.

V.K. Paul, a top COVID-19 adviser to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said the new virus strain would have no impact on vaccines being developed in India.

"(And) as of now, it has no impact on the potential of vaccines being developed in our country and (which) are available in other countries," said Dr VK Paul, a member of government think-tank NITI Aayog.

"It is also being said that in these viruses, the transmissibility has increased by 70 per cent, you can also call them super spreader in a way but it does not increase the propensity of death, hospitalisation and severity of the disease. What is affected is tendency to affect more people that by itself is a cause of concern. It is an adverse development," he said. "We are yet to spot such a virus in our country".

The government on Tuesday announced a new drill for all air passengers landing in India. Passengers would have to undergo RT-PCR tests and those who test positive for the virus would be put under institutional quarantine. The "contacts" of passengers who test positive will have go for institutional quarantine, too. According to the government, contacts will include all those within three rows of the infected passenger, said NDTV.

As many as 590 passengers landed in Mumbai from the UK in three aircraft on Tuesday, a civic official said, adding no Covid-19 symptomatic person was on board. As many as 299 passengers were sent to hotels for institutional quarantine and the rest will be sent to their states.

India has suspended all flights from Britain starting Wednesday until the end of the year.

(With inputs from Reuters and PTI.)