Four confirmed cases of Indian variant of novel coronavirus have been reported in Sindh, Parliamentary Secretary on Health Qasim Soomro revealed Monday while speaking on SAMAA's Naya Din.

According to the details, all the patients traveled back from Gulf countries and tested positive at the airport. No case of local transmission has been reported so far. “All the patients have been quarantined in Karachi and contact tracing has begun,” Soomro said and added that the patients were doing fine.

The health secretary said samples from over 50 Covid infected patients were taken in Sindh and 75% were found to be affected by the South African variant while the rest of 25% were affected by the UK, Brazil, and other strains.

“People have criticized the Sindh government’s lockdown in the province but we are only doing this to protect ourselves from a catastrophe,” the secretary remarked and emphasized that people should get vaccinated as soon as possible.

“We are going to remote areas in Sindh and are launching mobile vaccination centers so that everyone can be inoculated,” Soomro said and added, “All these rumors about the vaccines are false and people should not believe them.”

Pakistan on Friday had reported its first confirmed case of a coronavirus variant first identified in India. As per the detail, the variant case was detected by the National Institute of Health which conducted whole-genome sequencing of SARS CoV-2 samples collected during the first three weeks of May 2021, health ministry spokesperson Sajid Shah said in a statement.

"The sequencing results confirmed [the] detection of seven cases of B.1.351 (South African variant) and one case of B.1.617.2 (Indian variant)," the statement said, adding that this was the first in-country detection of the Indian strain.

According to Shah, the contact tracing of all the confirmed cases is in progress as per protocols.