What is the Delta or B1617 coronavirus variant from India?
The first two cases of a coronavirus variant identified in India have been reported in the Philippines.
The Department of Health (DOH) confirmed on May 11 that the virus was detected in two returning seafarers from Oman and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Both have recovered from the illness after being isolated for days on their return.
“They tested positive for the India variant. No history of travel to India or they did not come from India nor passed through India,” DOH undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire told the media.
What is the India variant?
The India variant of the COVID-19 virus has earned notoriety following the explosion of cases and deaths in India, overwhelming health workers in the densely populated country.
India currently has 22.66 million cases with 246,116 deaths thus far. Experts though argue that both numbers could be much higher than initially reported.
The country's Prime Minister Narendra Modi is now being called on and pressured, to enforce a nationwide lockdown to quell the increasing number of cases.
The variant that is spreading across India is labeled as B1617. It was classified as a “double mutant” and contains two mutations - L452R and E484Q.
What alarms experts about this variant were its reported ability to reduce vaccine efficacy.
The B1617 variant is also said to be more contagious thus probably explaining the fast transmission rate in India.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has already classified B1617 as a variant of global concern.
“There is some available information to suggest increased transmissibility,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO technical lead on COVID-19.
“Even though there is increased transmissibility demonstrated by some preliminary studies, we need much more information about this virus variant and this lineage and all of the sub-lineages," she added.
The Philippines has temporarily prohibited travelers coming from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka from entering the country.
At the moment, the Philippines has 1.1 million cases of COVID-19 and 18,562 recorded deaths.
Meanwhile, take a look at how Filipino celebrities based abroad deal with the COVID-19 crisis: