The first patient diagnosed with the XBC Deltacron covid strain in Thailand has fully recovered and the symptoms were not severe, the director-general of the Department of Medical Sciences said on Wednesday.
Dr Supakit Sirilak said the patient had not travelled abroad.
He said XBC was a hybrid of the Delta and Omicron BA.2 variants. It showed no signs of causing severe symptoms, but could be spread easily.
Dr Supakit said Thailand's first XBC patient had fully recovered after the infection was detected in a sample collected in October. Travel records showed the patient had not journeyed outside Thailand.
The department would keep monitoring coronavirus variants, he said, and advised people to get a fourth shot of Covid-19 vaccine, use face masks, keep social distancing and avoid crowded places.
He said the Delta variant of the virus had spread widely and then been replaced by Omicron and various Omicron subvariants, such as BA.1, BA.2, BA.4 and BA.5. Omicron remained the dominant strain of Covid-19 in Thailand, Dr Supakit said.
During the week Nov 19-25, single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP/deletion) testing of 299 people showed that the proportion of BA.2.75 infection increased to 63.3% from the previous week's 42.9%. Most cases were local infections.
Whole genome sequencing in Thailand showed 468 sequences of BA.2.75 sub-variant. This included 216 sequences of its descendants such as BA.2.75.2, BA.2.75.5.1 (BN.1) and BN.2.75.1.2 (BL.2), said Dr Supakit.
It was found the incidence of BN.1 increased four times over the previous week. Mutant strains had the possibility of increasing infections until they replaced the original strain.
He said there had been four cases of Omicron sub-variant XBB.1 and seven of BQ.1 detected in Thailand.
Dr Supakit Sirilak, director-general of the Department of Medical Science, says the first patient diagnosed with the XBC Deltacon covid strain has fully recovered. (Photo: Department of Medical Sciences Facebook)