Islamabad: Chairman Corona Task Force Committee on Science and Technology, Dr. Ata-ur-Rehman has said that a virus similar to new Covid-19 variant, which was discovered in United Kingdom (UK) earlier this week, has been identified in Karachi as well.
While exclusively speaking to GNN, the chairman said that research is underway to examine and observe the structural changes of this new virus strain.
“We have discovered a virus strain in Karachi, which is similar to the new Covid-19 variant found in UK. We have observed its structural changes and those are similar to strain identified London and other cities,” he said adding,”
“We identified this strain by doing a proper genetic sequence at Jamil-ur-Rahman Center for Genome Research. We studied 48 samples and observed that the changes in virus samples are similar to those in UK.”
Dr. Atta also stressed on the need to develop vaccines at the local level to curb the growing cases of coronavirus in the country.
“More than 200 companies are currently developing vaccines to deal with the new virus,” he added.
Referring to the effectiveness of the vaccine, Dr. Atta-ur-Rehman said that it would take a long time for the vaccine to be authentic.
“Scientists are constantly examining the mutations of virus to see its effectiveness. Pakistan also needs to promote research-based work so that our scientists are able to develop vaccines locally,” he added.