First fatality due to Delta Plus reported in Mumbai

A 63-year-old woman died at a hospital here, becoming the city’s first casualty due to the Delta Plus Covid variant. She succumbed to the infection on July 27, 6 days after testing positive for the deadly virus. Officials said that she had several comorbidities, including diabetes. She was on oxygen support and was administered steroids and Remdesivir.

As per the reports, the woman had taken both doses of the vaccine and among seven patients in Mumbai whose reports came positive for the Delta Plus variant.

Notably, this is Maharashtra’s second death from the Delta Plus. Earlier on June 13, an 80-year-old woman with comorbidities had succumbed to the infection. The woman hailed from Sangameswar and was admitted to the hospital, over 330 kilometres from Mumbai, Sanjay Shinde, Additional Collector, Ratnagiri told reporters.

Meanwhile, the Delta Plus variant of SARS-CoV2 has been detected in over 90 samples in the country so far. Sujit Singh, head of the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) said that four types of variants are categorised as Delta Plus — AY1 (B.1.617.2.1), AY2, AY3 and one more sub-lineage — in which one more gene has been detected and its only sample was found in Maharashtra.