The Civil Aviation Ministry on December 21 ordered to impose a short-term suspension on flights coming from UK just after the emergence of a new and extremely infectious strain of the coronavirus in Britain. “Considering the prevailing situation in the UK, the government of India has decided that all flights originating from the UK to India shall be temporarily suspended till December 31, 2020 (11.59pm). This suspension will start from 11.59pm, December 22, 2020,” the ministry had announced.
Meanwhile, India has recorded 14 more circumstances with the new UK coronavirus mutant strain, taking total quantity of such circumstances to 20.
Of the 20 circumstances, eight have been registered at National Centre for Disease Control in Delhi, 7 at National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences in Bangalore, two at Cellular and Molecular Biology in Hyderabad. One every has been logged at National Institute of Biomedical Genomics close to Kolkata, National Institute of Virology in Pune and CSIR Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology in Delhi.
The British government had lately announced that the newly identified strain of the virus located in their population is up to 70 per cent more transmissible.
It is vital to note that the presence of the new UK variant has currently been reported by Denmark, Netherlands, Australia, Italy, Sweden, France, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, Canada, Japan, Lebanon and Singapore.
(Inputs from Agencies)