Patient with JN.1 infection discharged, no new cases in Delhi at present: Delhi Health Minister Saurabh Bhardwaj

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Delhi Health Minister Saurabh Bhardwaj asserted that there are no new cases of JN.1 subvariant of COVID in Delhi at present after one patient infected with the virus was discharged on Thursday.

"We have increased the number of tests. Yesterday, we performed 636 tests in private and government hospitals combined. Three genome sequencing results were received yesterday, out of which two were old Omicron variants and one was JN.1," Minister Bhardwaj said.

Reassuring the public, the Health Minister highlighted, "The new variant is mild, and people are not getting severely ill because of this."

Providing specifics on the patient with the JN.1 variant, he said, "The patient has already been discharged from the hospital and is healthy now."

"We can say that there are no patients of JN.1 variant in Delhi currently," he added.

According to the Union Health Ministry data, India recorded 692 fresh cases of COVID-19 in the last 24 hours.

The total active caseload increased by four, reaching 4,097, the health ministry data said.

As per official data, six deaths have been reported in the country in the last 24 hours - two in Maharashtra, and one each in Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, and West Bengal.

With this, the total count of coronavirus cases in India since its outbreak in January 2020 has reached 4,50,10,944, with an increase of 702 cases in the last 24 hours. The total death toll due to COVID-19 cases in India has risen to 5,33,346, reflecting an increase of six deaths in the last 24 hours.

The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi has issued guidelines for COVID-19 suspected or positive cases that will be reported at hospitals following the sudden surge in the cases of Coronavirus in the country.

The JN.1 sub-variant is a descendant of the Omicron subvariant known as BA.2.86 or Pirola. The first case of the JN.1 variant of COVID-19 was reported in Kerala.

A total of 109 cases of the JN.1 sub-variant have been detected in India until Wednesday, as per Health Ministry sources.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recently classified JN.1 as a variant of interest, distinct from its parent lineage BA.2.86. However, the global health body emphasised that the overall risk posed by JN.1 remains low based on current evidence.

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