President Nana Akufo-Addo

A new variant of the novel coronavirus has been detected within the country.

This was disclosed by President Nana Akufo-Addo during his 22nd national update on the fight against the pandemic in Ghana.

“Recent genomic sequencing undertaken by our scientists have established that some arriving passengers tested positive for new variants of Covid-19,” he said.

A myriad of strains have, over the past few weeks, been detected case in many countries triggering concerns about the propensity if the newly developed vaccines to aid in the combatting the impact of the pandemic.

During the Sunday night address, he explained that in Ghana’s case “these passengers have all been isolated.”

“Furthermore, work is ongoing to determine the presence and extent of spread of the new variants in the general population,” he added in his first Covid-19 update since his inauguration on January 7.

So far, 352 persons have been confirmed to have died from the virus.

The number of active cases has also shot up to 1,924 as Covid-19 treatment centres “have gone from having zero patients to now being full because of the upsurge in infections,” according to the President.