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Sunday 20 December 2020
Already a dozen cases in the EU
British Crown variant is spreading
The new Corona variant has yet to appear in Germany. But according to the WHO, there are already proven cases in Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia. The new virus is also being discovered in Italy: the affected patient had returned from Great Britain in recent days.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has called on its European member states to toughen their corona measures in light of a new variant of the coronavirus in Britain. “In Europe, where transmission is high and widespread, countries must intensify their control and prevention measures,” said a spokeswoman for WHO Europe. Outside of the UK, eleven cases of the virus mutation, which is said to be significantly more contagious than the previous virus, have so far been reported: nine in Denmark and one each in the Netherlands and Australia.
Italy is now also reporting a case with the new Corona variant. The Ministry of Health of the southern European country announced that the mutation had been detected in a patient. The patient had returned from Great Britain with someone else in recent days and landed in Rome by plane. The patient is now in quarantine.
According to the chief virologist of the Berlin Charité, Christian Drosten, the variant has not yet appeared in Germany. “It has not been tested in Germany yet, but of course we take the reports from Britain, the UK very seriously,” Health Minister Jens Spahn said in ARD’s “Berlin report”. “Significantly faster transferability, as assumed in this case, would change a lot, of course, and that is why it is important to avoid entry into Germany, into continental Europe.”
Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, Austria and Ireland have cut their air connections with Great Britain or have announced it. Belgium cut off all traffic connections. France is also halting all British passenger traffic for 48 hours due to a new variant.
According to virologist Julian Tang from the British University of Leicester, the variant of the virus with the N501Y mutation appeared sporadically a few months ago, specifically in April in Brazil, in June and July in Australia and in July in the United States. The virus variant is currently causing a massive increase in corona infections in southern England and the British capital, London. According to initial findings by British scientists, a recently discovered variant of the virus is up to 70 percent more contagious than the previously known form. Prime Minister Boris Johnson emphasized Saturday that there was no evidence that vaccines against the mutation were less effective.
Large increase in hospital deliveries
Since its first appearance in mid-September in London or south-east Kent County, this variant has meanwhile become the “dominant” form of Sars-Cov-2, explained the British government’s chief scientific adviser, Patrick Vallance. . He attributed the “very high increase” in hospital admissions of Covid 19 patients in December to this development.
Due to the new variant of the corona virus, the German presidency of the EU Council is calling for an emergency meeting with representatives of other member states for Monday. Berlin is convening national experts in the framework of the international community crisis reaction mechanism (IPCR), as announced by a spokesperson for the German Council Presidency.
