New strain of coronavirus may be most contagious among children, scientists say



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LONDON – A new variant of the coronavirus that is spreading rapidly through the UK it has mutations that could mean that children are as susceptible to being infected as adults, unlike previous strains, scientists said Monday.

Scientists from New Respiratory Virus Threat Advisory Group (Nervtag), who are tracking the variation, said the new strain quickly became dominant in the south of the UK, and could soon do so in the rest of the country.

“We now have a high degree of confidence in the fact that this variety has a transmission advantage over other varieties that are currently in the UK,” he said. Peter horby, professor of infectious diseases at Oxford University and group director.

Neil ferguson, professor and epidemiologist of infectious diseases of the Imperial College London and also a member of the counseling group, said that “there is an indication that there is a greater propensity for infection in children.”

“We haven’t established any causality on this yet, but we can see it in the data,” Ferguson said. “We will need to collect more data to see how this new strain performs from now on.”

The emergence of the new mutated variant of Sars-CoV-2, which scientists say is up to 70% more transmissible than previous strains detected in the UK, led some countries to close their borders with the UK and placed large tracts of British territory. under severe restrictions during the Christmas period. / REUTERS



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