On Tuesday, the Health ministry said four people in the country were testing positive for infection with the South African variant, and one for the Brazilian version – the first for India.
While in India, there have been no reports of a community outbreak of this virus, Jameel believes there is also an immediate need to watch out for rural changes.
“Remember that India has about 11 million diseases now, so there could be home changes and I think for that it is very important to have a genomic study, which is done at scale, “said the virologist.
“And for the government of India they have set up an inter-ministerial Group called INSA COG which will bring together 10 national laboratories to start a series at a density of around 5 percent,” he said.
Currently, the virologist said that India continues to have a density of around 0.05 per cent.
“So basically, the plan is to update series about a hundred times in the country,” Jameel said.