India: What's behind the spike in COVID cases?

India has seen an increase in the number of daily new COVID-19 cases over the past few days, with virologists and epidemiologists saying that a new variant, XBB.1.16, could be the reason behind the surge.

According to Health Ministry data on Tuesday, the South Asian country logged 1,573 fresh infections in 24 hours, while the number of active cases had increased to 10,981.

That's up from the less than 100 new cases India reported on some days in January this year — which was the lowest rate since the onset of the pandemic in early 2020.