South African strain ‘spreading in UK’

THE highly infectious South African variant of Covid-19 is believed to be spreading across Britain.

From only two cases in December, the latest total is understood to be up to 30 in the UK and three in the Irish Republic.

The mutant strain, known as B1351, has also been spotted in Switzerland, France, Sweden, Finland, Australia and Botswana.

Details of the 30 UK cases are revealed in a report on new Covid variants by Edinburgh University academics. The true number of people infected is likely to be much higher as only a fraction of viruses from positive tests have their genetic code sequenced to monitor their mutations.

Public Health England refused to comment on the case numbers. Sources said that they were ‘carefully monitoring the variant strain’, which first occurred in South Africa in October and quickly spread around the country.

The first two UK cases were identified on December 20 in people who had contact with someone arriving from South Africa.

So far 4,000 Covid variants have been identified in the UK and different strains have been observed in many countries.

Japanese authorities are investigating four people who arrived from Brazil on January 2 carrying another variant. Japan’s National Institute of Infectious Diseases said the Brazilian and South African variants have two mutations in common.

One, called N501Y, is thought to make the virus more infectious and is also found in the new UK variant.

The other, E484K, appears to confer some resistance to antibodies collected from former patients and may have an impact on vaccines.