Too early to say anything on Kappa variant: UP doctor on Covid's new strain

As the emerging new strains of the Covid-19 virus are causing a lot of concern for the people, an Uttar Pradesh doctor on Friday said it is too soon to comment on the Kappa variant as it's still a 'variant of interest'.

"It is too early to say anything (on Kappa variant). When we tracked the patient's medical history, we found that he experienced a very high fever and breathing difficulty in a very short span of time. He was admitted in a very critical condition and died after almost 5 days," Dr Amresh Singh, assistant professor, and Head Microbiologist at BRD Medical College in Gorakhpur told ANI.

"We had sent around 72 samples to IGIB Gene Sequencing Centre in Delhi and received the reports for 30. The Delta variant was found in 27 of them, while Delta Plus was confirmed in 2, and 1 patient had Kappa variant," he added.

As per an official statement by the state government on Friday, two cases of the Kappa variant of Covid-19 have been detected in Uttar Pradesh after genome sequencing of 109 samples was done at the King George's medical college in Lucknow over the past few days.

"The Delta Plus variant of Covid-19 was found in 107 samples, while the Kappa variant was found in two samples. Both the variants are not new for the state. The facility of genome sequencing is being increased in the state," the statement issued post-Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's routine review meeting stated.