India recorded its lowest Covid-19 cases in 63 days and the lowest casualties in 77 days as the dip from the peak levels of the disease in September, which is being witnessed in the last few weeks, continued on Monday. Fresh cases on Monday at 53,082 are the lowest since August 10 when 51,296 infections were recorded. Fresh casualties at 696 are the lowest since July 27 when 638 deaths were recorded.
Though the figures on Monday have been lower than other days of the week since the outbreak of the pandemic and the dip has been attributed by experts mainly to fewer testing on Sundays, data from covid19.org showed that nearly a million tests (9,94,851) were conducted across the country on Sunday (October 11). This was marginally higher than 9,89,860 tests the previous Sunday (October 4), but far higher than the preceding two Sundays – 7,09,394 on September 27 and 7,31,534 on September 20.
Though most states showed a huge dip in fresh cases, the situation continued to be alarming in Karnataka, Kerala and Bengal which are yet to see a slowdown in the spread of the virus. Karnataka recorded 7,606 fresh cases which was higher than 7,089 cases registered by Maharashtra. This is the first time in many months that any state has recorded more cases in a day than Maharashtra. India’s active cases continued to slide for the eleventh consecutive day, and went below the 850,000 mark at 8,41,668.
Presence of ‘foreign-returned’ Covid-19 strain found in Gujarat
An analysis of nucleotides (NT) of Covid-19 DNA from the virus found in Gujarat by the state government-funded Gujarat Biotechnology Research Centre (GBRC) revealed that the dominant NT sequences were closer to virus strains from North America and Africa rather than Asia.
Two research projects by scientists at GBRC analysed the dominant genes and NTs across continents to ascertain the viral infection pattern and find correlations with gender and age. One gene can be made up of thousands of NTs, said researchers, adding that analysis of genes can give an insight into the virus’ composition and help develop a vaccine.
“NTs C3037T and A23403G were found in 93.45% of the samples in Gujarat and NT C241T was found in 92.7% samples. C3037T was found in 87.7% samples in Africa and 85.1% samples in North America. On the other hand, in Asia the prevalence was 49%. Likewise, A23403G was found in 89% samples in Africa and 85.1% in North America. In Asia, it was 49%,” said a senior researcher from GBRC.
In an earlier study, GBRC had pointed that the clades (wider group of genes) for Gujarat were different to the overall composition in India – while GH was found to be most dominant clade in Gujarat, present in nearly 50% samples, in India O, GR and GH had nearly similar shares.
“On the other hand, C18877T NT, prevalent in 57% of samples in Gujarat, has a less-than 12% share globally. At least eight NTs in G, C and A clades are also found more in Gujarat compared to other countries,” said another researcher.
About possible reasons for the phenomenon, researchers said movement between the continents in the initial phase of the pandemic could have resulted in the dominance of specific NTs and genes in specific regions. “Factors such as climate, viral load, age of the carrier and receiver, also play a part in deciding the dominant type of Covid-19 virus,” said a senior GBRC official.
