WHO Flags New Covid Strain as ‘Variant of Interest’ in Global Health Alert
JN.1 was originally labelled as an interesting variant because it comes from the same parent tree as BA.2.86.
WHO Flags New Covid Strain: The JN.1 coronavirus type was called a “variant of interest” by the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday. However, the WHO said it did not pose a major threat to public health.
“Based on the available evidence, the additional global public health risk posed by JN.1 is currently evaluated as low,” the WHO stated.
WHO Flags New Covid Strain as ‘Variant of Interest’ in Global Health Alert
JN.1 was originally labelled as an interesting variant because it comes from the same parent tree as BA.2.86.
The UN body said that current vaccines are still effective against JN.1 and other types of the COVID-19 virus that are still spreading, which can cause serious illness or death.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said earlier this month that the subvariant JN.1 makes up between 15% and 29% of cases in the US as of December 8.
It also said that there is no proof that JN.1 is more dangerous to public health than other versions that are currently spreading, and that Americans could stay safe from the variant with a new shot.
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The CDC says that JN.1 was first found in the US in September.
China found seven cases of the COVID subvariant last week.
The states were also told to make sure that all of the districts had enough testing and to keep the recommended amount of RT-PCR and Antigen tests. The Center also told the states to do more RT-PCR tests and send samples that were positive to the Indian SARS COV-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG) labs for genome sequencing.
Kerala reported 115 fresh Covid infections in the last 24 hours taking the total current cases of the virus in the state to 1,749. It was one of 142 cases reported across the country by 8 a.m. Tuesday. 115 of those cases were in Kerala. The state hasn’t had any deaths from the virus in the last 24 hours.
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