Genome sequencing: BA.2.38, BA.2 drive city’s Covid spike

The Omicron variant drove the third wave and we are seeing that the June surge is driven by its sub-lineages MANGALA GOMARE, executive health officer of BMC

MUMBAI: In the latest genome sequencing conducted by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) Kasturba Hospital Central Laboratory, it was discovered that the current June surge is mostly driven by the BA.2.38 and BA.2 - Omicron sub-lineages in Mumbai.

The BMC laboratory, which started genome sequencing from August last year, processed 364 samples collected between June 1-18. “Of all the samples collected, 49% had the BA.2.38 variant and 40% had the BA.2 variant. Only 5% had the BA.5% variant. Less than 2% of the sample had the BA.4 variant,” said a BMC health official. The official said that it would be interesting to see the interplay between the three sublinegaes. From June 1 to 24, the city has seen 38,059 fresh infections and 28 Covid deaths till date.

While the city has seen less than 2% hospitalisation and most cases have been milder, requiring home isolation, Dr Mangala Gomare, executive health officer, BMC said, “For genome sequencing, we took positive samples with high viral load for processing. The Omicron variant drove the third wave and we are seeing that the June surge is driven by its sublineages,” she said.

With people reluctant to get tested, BMC has instructed private practitioners, private hospitals and its own dispensaries to keep a watch on people with influenza-like illness (ILI) and severe acute respiratory infections (SARI) and conduct mandatory RT-PCR on them. Dr Gautam Bhansali, the chief coordinator of private hospitals for vaccination and Covid, said that the present form of the virus is self-limiting. “The symptoms and treatment in both Omicron and its sub-lineages have almost been the same. We have seen patients recover in three to four days,” he said.