Existing vaccines effective against variant from India: WHO official
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The official has issued the statement on the basis of what the WHO knows till now based on the discussions taking place with experts from all over the world
Despite growing concerns from experts around the world, the World Health Organization (WHO) representative to India has assured that the existing vaccines and diagnostics are effective against the B.1.617 variant of coronavirus.
Dr Roderico H Ofrin has issued the statement on the basis of what the WHO knows till now based on the discussions taking place with experts from all over the world, claims Indian news agency ANI.
"There has been an increasing rate of detection of this variant along with an increase and a surge of Covid-19 cases in parts of India. However, the relative contribution of this variant in the rapid increase of cases in the country remains unclear," Ofrin was quoted.
His statement has come at the same time when the WHO announced that the B.1.617 variant of coronavirus, which was first identified in India in October, has been detected in more than 4,500 samples from "44 countries in all six WHO regions" through an open-access database.
A day before the variant, which was first found in India in October, has been labelled as a "variant of concern" and has been added to the list of the deadly variants along with the ones found in Brazil and the UK.