Health Ministry denies presence of delta plus in Tripura

Agartala: A day after the raising alarm of detecting new strain – delta plus, the deadly and highly infectious variant of Covid in genome sequencing of samples by the Tripura government, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Sunday denied the report.
The statement said, “No case of Delta Plus reported from sample sequencing in Tripura. The samples tested revealed cases of Delta variant only.”
It elaborated that 152 samples were sent to NIBMG Kalyani of West Bengal for whole-genome sequencing, which had been found Covid positive in RT-PCR test during May and June this year.
“In the genome sequencing three samples were found B.1.1.7 (common variant), 11 samples were tested B.1.617.1 (kappa) and remaining 138 samples were B.1.617.2 (delta),” the ministry statement added.
The state surveillance officer of Covid Dr Deep Debbarma along with all experts on Saturday told media that Tripura had reported a new strain delta plus, the deadly in 90 per cent of the sample.
The state government had sent 151 samples from all eight districts of the state to the accredited genome testing laboratory in West Bengal and found them positive to delta plus.
They added, “As many as 115 samples of West Tripura district, eight in Sepahijala, five in Gomati, four in Unokoti, two each from North and South Tripura districts and one each in Khowai and Dhalai district were found delta plus variant . At least 10 samples have been found to be plain Delta variant and another three as an Alpha variant of the deadly virus.”