India has over 7,000 Coronavirus mutations, some serious |
COVID-19 danger continues to lurk in India as senior scientists say that there are more than 7,000 Coronavirus mutations in India, some of which could pose a serious risk. Rakesh Mishra, Director of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research – Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology ( CCMB), said among the variants, N440K is spreading a lot more in the southern states. The CCMB alone has done an exhaustive analysis of over 5,000 coronavirus variants in India and how they have evolved over the course of the pandemic. A team of the CCMB scientists also published a paper on their findings – “SARS-CoV-2 genomics: An Indian perspective on sequencing viral variants”. The Hyderabad-based Institute has been studying the evolution of the virus, its mutations and strains ever since the pandemic hit the country. Mishra, however, added that not every mutation becomes a variant. India has so far not been sequencing SARSCoV-2 isolates to full capacity, having deposited only 0.06 percent (about 6,400 genomes) of the over 10.4 million recorded cases. A research paper by the CCMB said, “Exploiting advances in genomic epidemiology by monitoring and increasing sequencing efforts following local spikes will go a long way in staying on top of mutations of concern while their biology and effects are studied in greater detail.” After the evolution of the UK and Brazilian strains of coronavirus which are found to be more transmissible, the Indian government stepped up the sequencing of the genomes.
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