Kappa strain detected in dead Panchmahal man

Vadodara: A Panchmahal district resident has become one of the first victims of Kappa variant of the novel coronavirus in the state. The 50-year-old man died on June 30.
A resident of Andar Na Muvada village in Godhra taluka, the victim was also suffering from severe diabetes. Sources in the health department said that the man had injured his foot around six months ago and the condition of his leg started deteriorating.Eventually, when he couldn’t use his leg, the family took him to a hospital in June.
The patient was initially rushed to a private hospital in Godhra and then to the Godhra Civil Hospital. He was then taken to the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital and later shifted to SSG Hospital in Vadodara. An official said that it was in Ahmedabad that his swab for an RT-PCR test was collected and sent for genome sequencing.
Panchmahal additional district health officer Dr J P Parmar said that the patient died on June 30 in Vadodara. He added that the sequencing was done by the National Institute of Virology and reports were shared with them on Saturday.
In the wake of the development, health surveys in the area where the patient stayed were done and RT-PCR tests of samples of close contacts were also performed. Parmar said that no symptomatic cases were reported in the drive and the tests were also found to be negative.