An emergency service worker collects Covid-19 test kits during a door-to-door mass test operation in Maidstone, UK, on Tuesday, February 2, 2021.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
LONDON – The United Kingdom is struggling to contain the spread of additional coronavirus mutations, with the most worrying variant first discovered in South Africa appearing spontaneously in different parts of the country.
British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the country had to “demote” itself with the South African variant after 105 cases were reported, and 11 of those cases were not linked to international travel.
As such, the UK has launched an improved testing program for some 80,000 people living in areas where pockets of cases have been found with the mutation. Tests are being offered door to door and positive cases will be evaluated to see if they are caused by the South African variant.
People in these areas have been told to limit their time away from home, while health officials struggle to prevent the spread of another, more infectious variant. A mutation, now known as a “British mutation”, has already become the dominant strain in many parts of the country.
Earlier this week, Public Health England published another technical briefing in which it warned that a handful of cases of coronavirus of the variant found in the UK had undergone an additional mutation to include the E484K mutation, which was first seen in the South Africa variant. South.
Mutations in any virus are normal; viruses mutate all the time. But experts and lawmakers are concerned about mutations that allow the virus to spread much more quickly.
The South Africa variant further worried experts, who were concerned that coronavirus vaccines developed last year were not as effective against it; there were also concerns that the South African variant could escape antibiotic drugs.
Vaccine manufacturers said there is little evidence to show that their vaccines will be ineffective against new variants, and say they should be able to adapt their vaccines to new variants in a few weeks, if necessary.
On Wednesday, British pharmaceutical GlaxoSmithKline and German biotechnology company CureVac announced a 150 million-euro ($ 180 million) deal to develop Covid vaccines that target multiple variants in a product. The partners hope to launch these vaccines in 2022.
The UK’s vaccination program continues to gain momentum and is on track to vaccinate its four priority groups (over 70, residents and staff in nursing homes, first-rate social and health workers and the clinically extremely vulnerable), totaling about 15 million people, in mid-February.
On February 1, more than 9.6 million people received the first dose of the vaccine and just under 500,000 received two doses, according to government data.