The Department of Medical Science (DMS) is keeping a close watch on the domestically found sub-variants of Delta but has, however, tried to play down public fears over the latest emergence of the mutated virus.
DMS director-general Supakit Sirilak on Tuesday said at a press briefing that the mutation of the virus is a normal phenomenon.
He said currently there is not enough information about the sub-variants to compare with the Delta variant that is dominating the country.
The four Delta sub-variants found in the country have also been discovered in several other countries, especially AY.4, which has been reported in 67% of cases in the United Kingdom, 3% in the United States and Denmark and 2% in Spain and France.
"We don't want the public to think it is a Thai strain. Those mutated sub-variants have not yet even been classified as 'variants of concern'. So we aren't worried about them. We are just monitoring them closely to verify their capability," Dr Supakit said.
He went on to say that he reported the latest case to the Department of Disease Control, which will take a look at whether the mutated sub-variants of Delta are stronger or more resistant to Covid-19 vaccines.
The Centre for Medical Genomics of Ramathibodi Hospital recently detected the sub-variant AY.4 (B.1.617.2.4), which has been found in 3% of samples in a hospital in Pathum Thani province.
Other sub-variants found were the AY.6 (B.1.617.2.6), which was found in 1% of samples from all over the country and the AY.10 (B.1.617.2.10) and AY.12 (B.1.617.2.15), which were found in 1% of samples from Bangkok.
The head of the hospital's Centre for Medical Genomics, Wasun Chatratita, said that the mutated sub-variants of Delta were found domestically, not in state quarantine, adding that the important issue is that there needs to be further study into the efficacy of the vaccine against those mutated sub-variants of Delta.
According to the department's examination of 2,295 samples, it was found that 92.9% of them were dominated by the Delta variant, followed by 5.8% by Alpha and 1.3% by Beta, which has only been found in the southernmost provinces.
Meanwhile, Bangkok governor Pol Gen Aswin Kwanmuang said the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration has set up treatment centres and Covid-19 hotlines in all 50 districts in order to get the highest number of infected people treated urgently.
