Tripura government has warned people to take precautions after double mutant strain of coronavirus and those that were found in the UK and Africa was found in the state, said officials on Friday.  The government decided to carry out full-fledged virus tests for the passengers arriving in the state via airways and roadways, and quarantine the infected ones, added the officials.

After receipts of the test results of outsiders were out, Tripura Health Secretary JK Sinha held a virtual meeting on Thursday with the district magistrates, superintendent of police, and chief medical officers of all the eight districts, and urged them to take all the required precautions and maintain COVID-19 norms, said officials.  

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Radha Debbarma, Director of Health,  and Tapan Majumder, professor of microbiology department of Agartala Government Medical College, said that 19 samples collected from coronavirus infected people were sent outside the state for advanced virological tests. 17 of those samples were found to be infected with the highly infectious and deadly virus strains of COVID-19.

Of the 17 infectious samples, 11 were found infected with the double mutant variety that devastated Maharashtra, five were of British strain origin and one strain of African origin. So people should strictly adhere to all COVID norms for safety, Majumder told reporters on Friday.

Siddhartha Shiva Jaiswal, Director of the state National Health Mission, said that in the second wave, people aged between 20 and 40 years are the most affected by the virus in Tripura.

Of the 665 people who tested positive for coronavirus till April 23, a total of 50.79 % of them were between the ages of 20 and 40 and were infected with the deadly disease, he said.

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Jaiswal said that children below 10 years are also being infected by the virus but people in their sixties are relatively protected from corona infection.

A total of 8.39 lakh people of the state have taken the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, which is 24% of the state’s population and is much higher than the national average of only six per cent.

Meanwhile, at least 166 more people tested positive for COVID-19 in Tripura on Friday pushing the tally in the state to 35169, a health department official said.

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The death toll remained at 393 as no one succumbed to the infection.

Tripura currently has 1,020 active coronavirus cases, while 33,555 people have recovered from the disease, the official said.