A new variant of Coronavirus has been found in Britain that is spreading faster in Southern England, British MPs have been told.
Matt Hancock, Health Secretary, said 60 different local authorities have recorded cases infected by the new variant of Coronavirus. He added, WHO (World Health Organization) has been recognized and several studies are ongoing through UK scientists. He said, there was nothing to suggest about this variant and the vaccines would no longer work on this.
In the House of Commons, he said that over the last week, there had been a sharp and exponential rise in Coronavirus cases across London, Kent, parts of Essex and Hertfordshire.
Currently, there are over 1000 cases identified infected with the new variant of Coronavirus in the South of England, and cases have been identified in nearly 60 different local authority areas.
“We don’t know to which extent it can go because of the new variant but we have to take swift and deceptive action which is absolutely essential to control this deadly disease until the vaccine is rolled out” he added.
On this shocking news, England’s Chief Medical Officer Prof Chris Whitty put his statement saying- “the current swab tests would detect the new variant that has been found predominantly in Kent and neighboring areas in recent weeks”.
The new variant involves the spike protein of the virus- the part that helps to infect cells- and target Covid vaccines are designed around. It is important to know soon what this will do to the behavior of the virus.
Prof Alan McNally, an expert at the University of Birmingham, said “Let’s not be hysterical. It may not be more transmissible or infectious or dangerous. It’s just something to keep an eye on” officially.
Hundreds and thousands of news are revolving about this new variant of the Coronavirus. Every health expert is coming out with their own studies and research. Among them, Dr. Jeremy Farrar, Director of Wellcome, is like- the new variant was potentially serious. “The surveillance and research must continue and we must take the necessary steps to stay ahead of the virus.”
Huge efforts are going at characterizing the variant and understanding its emergence. It is significant to keep a calm and rational perspective on the strain as this is normal virus evolution and we expect new variants will come and go over time.
This is the simple rule of understanding the all-new variant of the virus.
Matt Hancock said the new variant of coronavirus may be associated with the rapid spread of the virus in the South-East of England. This is not right to say, it is causing the rise and Mr. Hancock didn’t say that this virus has evolved to spread from person-to-person more readily.
New strains can become more common for reasons that have nothing to do with the virus. One explanation for the emergence of the Spanish Strain over the summer was tourism.
So at this moment, there are scary headlines everywhere, but still no scientific detail to know how dangerous the new virus is.
Another view added by one of the esteemed professors – Mr. Jonathan Ball, Professor at Molecular Virology at Nottingham University- “ The genetic information in many viruses can change very rapidly and sometimes these changes can benefit the virus by allowing it to transmit more efficiently or to escape from the vaccine or treatments, but many changes have no effect at all.
“Even though a new genetic variant of the virus has emerged and is spreading in many parts of the UK, this can happen completely by chance”.
“Therefore, it is important to study the genetic changes as they occur to work out if they are affecting how the virus behaves, and until we have done that important work it is premature to make any claims about the potential impacts of virus mutation,”
