The first case of the Indian variant of the coronavirus in Mexico was detected in San Luis Potosí
The first case of the so-called Indian variant of covid-19 has been detected in Mexico. This is a man resident in San Luis Potosí who had been hospitalized for pneumonia, as confirmed this Sunday by the State Health Secretariat. The patient, 40 years old, had had contact with people coming from the United States and is in isolation. It is the first infection in the country of the B.1.617 variant, which he has put on high alert to all Governments in the face of the health emergency that has caused in India.
“The case is fully confirmed by the federal authorities and was isolated at the beginning of the month,” declared Miguel Ángel Lutzow Steiner, Secretary of Health of the entity. “The effect of the variant on the effectiveness of treatments and antibodies is being investigated, although it is under study and could be moderate and not relevant,” the doctor noted. The variant was identified on Saturday by the Institute for Epidemiological Diagnostics and Reference (InDRE) as part of the genomic surveillance program for the epidemic. “This should not surprise us in any way. This virus mutates, it has a great capacity for mutation and we have to reinforce preventive measures. "It's not about alarming," said Lutzow, who insisted on not letting his guard down.
This week, the sky over some large Indian cities was filled with smoke from mass cremations of those killed by Covid. The Asian country, which has 1.366 million inhabitants, surpassed the world record for infections on Monday with more than 350.000 cases in a single day. The daily deaths are more than 2.000. The situation is critical: hospitals, especially those in the capital, New Delhi, are found collapsed, there is not enough oxygen to care for all the patients who need it, nor enough diagnostic tests to get an accurate idea of how many cases there really are.
Meanwhile, governments and scientists from around the planet look with concern at the variant that circulates in the country with three mutations that make it potentially more infective. Almost everything about this new version is still unknown, but the World Health Organization does has warned which could be more contagious and partly escape vaccines. Even so, for now it has only been classified as a “variant of interest” and not as a “variant of concern”, a list that does include the versions from the United Kingdom, Brazil, South Africa and California, of which there is evidence that they are more virulent.
The Indian variant, which was first identified in the fall of last year, more or less at the same time as the one in the United Kingdom, has been registered in around twenty countries, including France, the United States and Singapore. Three subvariants are already known, one of them without one of the most worrying mutations. Some experts consider that the fact that it has been circulating for so long questions whether it is very transmissible. For now, the Covaxin vaccine, developed in India from deactivated viruses and approved since the beginning of the year, neutralizes the new variant.
Source: https://elpais.com/mexico/2021-05-02/detectado-en-san-luis-potosi-el-primer-caso-de-la-variante-india-de-covid-19-en- mexico.html
