Fears over new virus infections

BRITAIN faces a major coronavirus outbreak after the illness struck down two GPs.

Public health officials have shut down their surgery and are urgently trying to trace any patients who might have been infected.

The doctors are among 11 Britons thought to have caught the virus from a ‘super-spreader’, a middleaged businessman who contracted it on a business trip to Singapore.

He apparently passed it on to a group he stayed with at a French ski chalet close to Mont Blanc. Six of the

infected Britons are being treated in France and Spain, but the other five – including the two GPs – are back in the Brighton area. It is feared that the ‘super-spreader’, who is in an isolation unit, came into contact with hundreds of people on his return to Britain.

The World Health Organisation expressed its alarm at the situation last night. ‘The detection of this small number of cases could be the spark that becomes a bigger fire,’ said its directorgeneral, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

He also said it was worrying that the illness had been transmitted by people with no travel history to China, where the virus originated.

As the death toll in China passed 900 and the Department of Health declared a ‘serious and imminent threat’:

■ The Government handed itself new powers to arrest anyone suspected of having coronavirus;

■ The number of cases in Britain has reached eight – including two Chinese nationals infected in York;

■ Private schools were advised to tell pupils not to travel to South-East Asia during next week’s half-term;

■ A student at the University of Sussex in Brighton was admitted to hospital with suspected coronavirus;

■ A private school in Southampton was closed for three days after pupils were put into isolation with virus symptoms;

■ A Chinese citizen journalist who raised

‘Told to go into quarantine’

the alarm about coronavirus has been missing since last Thursday;

■ UK healthcare workers have now tested 1,100 people for the virus;

■ British Airways cancelled all flights to and from China until April.

Tracking down the patients of the two Brighton doctors has been made a priority because the virus is known to be particularly dangerous for those with health conditions.

NHS sources stressed a maximum of 15 patients came into contact with the GPs since their return from the chalet. But Whitehall sources suggested the cluster of cases meant hundreds of people would have to be tested for the virus.

At least one of the infected doctors is thought to have practised at the County Oak Medical Centre on Carden Hill. It was shut down yesterday for a deep clean. Until it reopens, the surgery’s 7,600 patients have been told to call NHS 111 if they are unwell or 999 if they have a life-threatening emergency.

A GP who has worked at the practice, Catriona Greenwood, owns the French chalet with her husband. However, there is no official confirmation that she is infected with the virus.

Public Health England is also trying to trace anyone who came into contact with the other Britons who were infected on the ski holiday. They have told a dozen people in Brighton to go into quarantine and they are sending them texts every morning asking them to reply ‘yes’ or ‘no’ if they have symptoms.

Five staff at the Grenadier pub in Hove have been instructed to ‘self-isolate’ after the super-spreader spent two hours there on February 1.

Professor Yvonne Doyle, medical director of PHE, said: ‘Two of these new cases are healthcare workers and as soon as they were identified, we advised them to selfisolate in order to keep patient contact to a minimum.

‘We are now working urgently to identify all patients and other healthcare workers who may have come into close contact, and at this stage we believe this to be a relatively small number.’

The fact this super-spreader passed the disease to 11 Britons – five of whom returned to the UK and may have infected others themselves – has concerned scientists. Last week, England’s Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty said patients tended to spread the disease to only two or three people.

Andrew Freedman of Cardiff University’s School of Medicine said: ‘It does appear the index case has passed on the infection to an unusually large number of contacts.

‘As such, he could be termed a super-spreader. This may occur as a result of someone being infectious despite having few or no symptoms, meaning they are unaware they have the infection.

‘It can also result from someone coming into close contact with an unusually large number of people or someone carrying a larger than normal quantity of the virus.’

The super-spreader, who lives in Brighton, contracted the virus at a conference at the Grand Hyatt hotel in Singapore organised by Servomex, a British firm.

He then flew to France and spent four days in a chalet in Les Contamines-Montjoie, near Megeve.

In Scotland, 57 people have been tested for coronavirus, the latest official figures reveal. All returned

negative results. The number tested in Scotland has risen by 16 since Sunday.

Laboratories at Glasgow Royal Infirmary and the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh have been set up to test patients for the virus.

Scotland’s Chief Medical Officer Dr Catherine Calderwood

said that while there have been no confirmed cases north of the Border so far, there is a ‘high likelihood’ a patient will test positive for the disease in future.

On its website, the Scottish Government said: ‘We continue to monitor the situation closely.’