Kolkata, Dec 27 (IANS): Five fresh cases of Covid-19 were reported till December 26 evening in West Bengal taking the total number of affected people in the state during the current season to 10.

All of them are currently under treatment at two different private hospitals in Kolkata, an official of the state health department said. “The genome sequencing of all five of them will be done to trace whether these are the cases of new sub-variant JN.1,” the official said.

Earlier on December 22, five cases of Covid-19 positive persons were reported from different pockets of West Bengal with one of the affected individuals being a six-month old child. The genome sequencing was also done for them and to the relief of the state health department the new sub-variant JN.1 was not traced in the test.

The state health department official further said that although any fresh health guideline has not been issued in West Bengal so far, the department officials are keeping a close monitoring over the situation.

“The situation so far is far from being alarming. So there is no necessity for issuing guidelines right at this moment. However, our department officials are alert and the different authorities of the state- run hospitals have been asked to keep themselves prepared for any eventuality. Some beds in the ICU in a couple of hospitals have also been kept reserved for future affected people,” the health department official said.