Tunisian health officials announced that two people have been tested positive for a new variant of COVID-19 in the governorate of Tunis.
Recent medical reports revealed that the new variants of the virus, discovered in the UK, South Africa, and Brazil, are highly transmissible compared to the Chinese strain.
Director of the Pasteur Institute Hashemi al-Wazir affirmed that the two new cases were discovered by coincidence after a number of tests were conducted.
Wazir said that the first case is asymptomatic while the second is a senior suffering from critical illness and has passed away.
The Tunisian authorities will intensify research and analysis to know more about this new variant.
Head of the Health and Social Committee in the Tunisian Parliament Dr. Sohail Alouni said that the current laboratory tests in the country are incapable of detecting the recently discovered variants.
He noted that the Health Ministry will import new type of tests to serve this purpose.
Tunisian Health Ministry on Saturday reported 903 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total number of infections in the country to 227,643.
On the same day, 36 deaths were recorded, bringing the toll to 7,755.
