Rising COVID Cases in Port Sudan Could Be Caused by Delta Variant

KHARTOUM - Health authorities in Sudan’s Red Sea state town of Port Sudan say they have seen a significant increase in the number of COVID-19 cases in recent days and suspect the rise is due to the highly contagious delta variant.

Health officials say over the past week they have recorded nearly 140 new cases of the virus. Doctor Zafaran Ahmed Azzaki, director general at the Red Sea state health ministry, told VOA’s South Sudan in Focus that symptoms in the new cases appear slightly different from those identified in the previous wave of COVID-19 cases, prompting health officials to believe the new wave could be linked to the delta variant. “The infection rate has been very high in recent days, and we still believe that there are a lot of positive cases that are not reaching the hospital. Suspected cases have increased and 90 percent of them are found positive and automatically, cases of death also have increased,” Dr. Azzaki said.