Chikungunya spread wider this year, say docs; NIV looks for mutations, newer variants of virus

Pune: Chikungunya, especially in cities, occurs in small densely populated pockets. This year, however, doctors in Pune are reporting a much wider spread, with patients coming in from peri-urban areas too.
Pune city has had 243 confirmed chikungunya cases as of Sept 23. The Yerwada-Kalas-Dhanori civic ward has reported 68 cases; next is the Nagar Road-Wadgaonsheri ward, with 39 patients.
Doctors said patients have come in from core city areas and surrounding regions."We've had outstation patients too," said Dr Bharat Purandare, an infectious diseases consultant with Deenanath Mangeshkar Hospital. "Usually, chikungunya is reported within small pockets of a particular area. But we've getting cases from across the city, be it central Pune or the suburbs. It has also surpassed dengue in intensity this year," he said.
The spread has also prompted the central and state health departments to dig deeper. On Sept 21, the health ministry told PMC to compile data on patients reporting complicated symptoms. The state health department on its part has told PMC to also reach out to doctors treating chikungunya patients for information.
The National Institute of Virology (NIV), meanwhile, has been studying patient samples to determine if Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) variants have been responsible for the spike in cases this year.
"From July to Sept 15, ICMR-NIV tested 3,208 samples for chikungunya. from Pune city and Pune district. We found 1,004 samples to be positive," said Dr Naveen Kumar, NIV's director, adding that sequencing is underway to look for emergence of a newer variant or a change in the virulence of the chikungunya virus strain.