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“When the virus changes its methods of attack, we must change our method of defense,” Boris Johnson said on Saturday when, at a press conference, he announced that London and the South West of England will be confined again for Christmas. – and that even in the less critical areas the English will have to remain in the area of their homes, given the increase in infections.
Johnson justified the return of the strict measures with the discovery of a variant of the coronavirus, already called VUI-202012/01, which he guaranteed that it could be 70% more transmittable than its original version and that will be responsible for the exponential increase in the number of infected. In practice, according to the British Government, epidemiologists believe that R can increase by 0.4 points.
At the moment, the estimate is that this mutation is already responsible for 62% of new infections in London, 59% in the East of England and 43% in the South East in the country, says Sky News.
At the press conference, along with Prime Minister Boris Johnson, were also the Director General of Health, Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance, scientific consultant. Patrick Vallance said that the new strain has 23 changes compared to the old one, “a very unusual number”. The problem is the speed with which it spreads: “The infections grew very, very quickly,” added Chris Whitty.
In Sky News, Federico Giorgi, professor at the University of Bologna and author of studies on the virus, has already left the conviction that the slow evolution of the virus during these months indicates that treatments – and vaccines – must continue to be effective, even in this new variant.
Even so, for now, still there is no evidence that it is more deadly or even has more serious consequences, according to the BBC and The Guardian.
Why this new variant spreads faster is what scientists are studying, as well as why it is affecting it more aggressively in southern England.
But, with the UK already starting the vaccination process (300,000 people have already received the first dose), the bigger question is if the virus, in this mutation, can make the vaccine less effective. “There is no evidence at this time that it can go into effect,” said Chris Whitty, adding that it would be “surprising” if it did. However, this expert warned, more research will be needed to confirm this, so “it is more urgent than ever” that people strictly abide by the rules.
A new variant of the coronavirus has also been detected in South Africa, the ‘501 V2’, which, according to the Minister of Health of that country, is affecting a segment of the younger population, as Lusa reported this Saturday. Minister Zweli Mkhize also reported this finding to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The team of researchers who identified the new variant believe that it was responsible for the increase in the level of infections in the last two months, explained the South African Minister of Health, adding that there was a change in the epidemiological landscape “mainly with younger patients” . what develop severe forms of the disease“.
To date, seven strains of Covid-19 are known. The original, which appeared in Wuhan, is L. The one that developed in Europe and the US is G, which, because these regions took longer to restrict circulation, rapidly developed into the GR, GH, and GV variants , Explain. Sky. Its most common mutation is D614G, which experts still debate whether or not it is more contagious than the previous ones.
