Even as the panic over the second variant of coronavirus is still in the air, a third variant has now been detected in the UK, Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced on Wednesday.
Announcing the development at a press briefing where he outlined further restrictions in south and east England, Hancock said there are two cases of the new variant in the UK, both contacts of cases who have travelled from South Africa. “This virus is yet more transmissible and appears to have mutated further than the new virus,” Hancock said.
South Africa’s health department said last week that a new genetic mutation of the virus had been discovered and might be responsible for a recent surge in infections there.
“Thanks to the impressive genomic capability of the South Africans, we’ve detected two cases of another new variant of coronavirus here in the UK,” Hancock told a media briefing. “Both are contacts of cases who have travelled from South Africa over the past few weeks.”
The new cases have been quarantined, and restrictions on travel from South Africa have been imposed, he added, appealing to anyone who has been in South Africa in the past fortnight or is a close contact of someone who has been to South Africa in the last fortnight to quarantine themselves immediately.
Britain is already battling to curb the spread of a mutated strain of the virus which is up to 70% more transmissible, and Hancock said the new variant appeared to have mutated further and was more infectious.
Countries around the world have in recent days closed their borders to both Britain and South Africa following the identification of the new, fast-spreading variants of the coronavirus.
Susan Hopkins from Public Health England expressed confidence that the spread of the South Africa-linked variant would be controlled and said vaccines that have already been developed should be effective.
“We have no evidence at the moment that the vaccine will not work, so actually what that means in fact is that there’s strong evidence that it will work, because the vaccine produces a strong immune response and it’s broad and acts against lots of variation in the virus,” she said.