Union Health Ministry has said that a case of COVID-19 Sub-variant JN.1 has been detected in Kerala. Director General of the Indian Council of Medical Research Dr Rajiv Bahl has informed that the case was detected as part of the ongoing routine surveillance activity by the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium-INSACOG. It is a network of Genomic Laboratories that has been monitoring COVID-19 in India from a genomic perspective.
The case was detected in an RT-PCR positive sample which was tested positive last month. The patient had mild symptoms of influenza-like illness (ILI) and has since recovered from Covid-19.
The Ministry added that there has been an increasing trend of COVID-19 cases from the State of Kerala since the last few weeks and this has been attributed to an increase in number of samples from ILI cases being referred for testing. It said a majority of these cases are clinically mild and recovering on their own at their homes without any treatment.
The Health Ministry said that it is in regular touch with the State Department of Health, Kerala and monitoring various points of entry. The Ministry added that as part of a regular exercise, a mock drill in all health facilities in States is currently underway to assess their public health and hospital preparedness measures. This activity, which started on 13th of this month is being carried out under the overall supervision of the district collectors and is likely to be completed by Monday.
