Health Minister Veena George has said that antibodies against Nipah virus have been found in samples of fruit-eating bats collected from Maruthonkara in Kozhikode district where the infection was reported in September.
Addressing the media in Wayanad on Thursday, she said the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had communicated this to the State government in an email. Antibody presence had been confirmed in 12 bat samples collected from Maruthonkara. The Minister’s comments come against lab tests earlier ruling out the presence of the virus from live bat samples collected from Maruthonkara.
The Minister also said that the One Health system would be strengthened in the State to meet challenges posed by the Nipah virus. It was earlier reported that there had been no genetic mutations in the Bangladeshi strain of the virus that caused outbreaks in Kerala in 2018, 2019, 2021, and 2023.
