Four cases of BF.7 Omicron subvariant detected in India so far

India has so far reported 4 cases of BF.7, a sub lineage of Omicron- which is driving the current surge in China. The good news is that no "unusual pattern" or "clustering" is seen in the country, a senior health ministry official told ET.

These cases have been reported from Gujarat and Odisha, he added. BF.7 has been seen replacing the variants dominant in the United States and several European countries.

"But there is no need to panic as no unusual pattern, increase in hospotalisation or severity has been seen in India," he added.


The BF.7 is the same as BA.5.2.1.7, which is a sub-lineage of the Omicron sub-lineage BA.5.

The health minister Mansukh Mandaviya chaired a high level meeting on Wednesday urging to beef up genome sequencing to keep a track of existing and emerging variants.

To review the situation, the Indian Sars-CoV-2 Consortium on Genomics (Insacog), a network of laboratories monitoring genomic variations of Covid-19 virus in the country, will also hold a meeting on Friday in the light of a new wave in China.

“The meeting will be held to review the situation. We will evaluate whether there’s any increase in the number of cases,” a member of the consortium told ET on the condition of anonymity.

Until last month, the BXX sub variant had become dominant in the country accounting for over 50% of Covid-19 cases. BXX is a recombinant variant. It had replaced BA2.75 which was accounting for 25-30% of Covid-19 cases.

BA.2.75 was the dominant variant till October.

In the last few months multiple Omicron sub variants like BQ.1 and BXX have been detected in the country along with other emerging sub variants like BA5.1.7 and BF.7.

BXX— a virus formed from a combination of the omicron sub variants BA.2.75 and BA.2 — was first reported by Singapore in September and has so far been confirmed in many countries including India. In Singapore, BXX had overtaken the previously dominant strain BA.5 in October.