Indian new virus variant to be sent to the UK for vaccine test

The new variant of the deadly virus which has been founded in India will be shifted to the UK for the Vaccine test.

By Saba Munawar Shaikh On May 4, 2021

The second wave of Covid 19 in India is suspected to be because of the new variant of the virus. The new variant named B.1.617 was founded in the Vidarbha area of Maharashtra in December last year.

Now at the request of the United Kingdom, the sample of this double mutant Indian variant of the virus is being sent to the United Kingdom for the vaccination test.

Rakesh Mishra a retired director of the Hyderabad Center of Cellular and Molecular Biology confirmed the news by stating that the sample of the virus culture is in process of being sent to the UK. As well as there is an exchange of sample variants. The next shipment of the same will be happening in the next few days.

This new variant has become the major global attention, because of the possibility that it is playing a role in the second wave of the virus in India.

This new variant is still not solely considered as the main reason for the second wave. But the scientists believe that this might be the primary reason at least in the Vidarbha region. WHO has declared that this new strain has been founded in at least 17 countries including the US, UK, and Singapore.

In the last few days, several countries have put a restriction on Indian travellers in the fear of the virus spread. In the recent interview of Anthony Fauci, one of the most known influential infectious disease experts said that Indians should make a sample of these variants available to the US, UK, and other countries for further analyses.

Mishra has stated that the request for the variant from the United Kingdom was received a few weeks ago and the process of sending the same is being prepared.

The UK has also decided to send their sample of the variant found in their population for vaccination testing in India. Taking into consideration all the norms and the rules of the international biodiversity exchange, a further process will be done.

According to the study of India both the vaccine is effective to this new variant. But it has not been tested against the other vaccines such as Pfizer or Moderna because of their unavailability in India.