On Thursday, an infection caused by Omicron’s new XBB sub variant accounted for 71 cases across a few states, namely Maharashtra, followed by West Bengal, Odisha, and Tamil Nadu. Odisha reported 33 cases in a fortnight, followed by Bengal (17) and Tamil Nadu (16) respectively. Since August, the XBB strain, also known as BA.2.10, has been detected in several countries, including Australia, Bangladesh, Denmark, India, Japan, and the United States.

In India, scientists involved in genome sequencing claimed that BA.2.75 was responsible for approximately 88% of new infections, while the XBB sub variant was responsible for approximately 7% of all cases. They added that currently, the prevalence of BA.5 in samples is less than 5%.

Dr. Rajesh Karyakarte, the state coordinator for genome sequencing, stated that XBB has been found in many parts of the world, but it is spreading rapidly in Singapore. Within three weeks, it had grown to account for more than half of all daily cases there. He explained that the XBB strain, also known as BA.2.10, evolved from the BA.2 Omicron sub variant strain.

Another expert, Dr. Raj Rajnarayanan, a professor at the New York Institute of Technology’s Jonesboro, Ark., noted, that due to the combination of mutations from other strains, the new strain is probably the most immune-evasive yet.

Similarly, a preprint study published on October 4 by Peking University and Changping Laboratory discovered that XBB had the greatest ability to evade antibody protection among newly emerging variants.

(Source: https://www.news18.com/news/india/cases-of-omicrons-xbb-variant-now-rising-in-india-should-you-be-worried-over-the-immunity-evasive-strain-6161761.html )