XBB variant remains dominant in TN, no cases of BF.7

CHENNAI: Even as the safety measures over the increasing cases of BF.7 variant of Omicron has led to a surge in the cases of Covid in China, Japan, Hong Kong and other countries, the XBB variant remains dominant and BF.7 variant cases have not yet been reported in Tamil Nadu so far.

The state health department officials say that sub-lineage of various variants of Omicron have been reported since the third wave but BF.7 has not reported any case currently.

Of about 8,000 passengers arriving from the foreign countries in Tamil Nadu, more than 160 samples are being tested at the International Airports as part of the mandatory two percent random RT-PCR testing protocol for the international arrivals.

"The XBB variant is the dominant variant until now as more than 75 percent of the samples revealed the same upon genomic sequencing. The other variants are BA.2 or BA.5 and even Delta. The BF.7 variant is not of much concern so far to the State," said P Sampath, joint director at Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine.

The individuals are being mandatorily tested if international passengers arriving from China, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Thailand are symptomatic. Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya had directed the same on Saturday and the testing of these passengers has begun. The random sampling started across the country on Saturday.

"The passengers coming on direct flights from these countries are required to be tested and currently, Tamil Nadu does not have any direct flights so the passengers with symptoms are being tested and the random testing is also being done. Most of the flights are from Delhi and testing is being conducted at the Delhi International Airport," said Dr Sampath.