Dr Fauci warns South African covid is ‘a little more concerning’

Has the variant been found in the US? 

Not yet. 

The US has not sequenced nearly as high as share of coronavirus samples as the UK has, but is ramping up its efforts in the hopes of detecting the South African variant and other mutations earlier. 

Where has the variant been found?  

The variant was found in two people, one in London and another in the North West, who came into contact with separate people returning from South Africa.

The fact that they were detected through random routine sampling which picks out only around one in 10 tests carried out in the UK – and that they are thought to have been infected by separate travelers – suggests there are many more cases of the variant already in Britain. 

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said it was ‘highly concerning’ and the variant was ‘yet more transmissible’ than the original strain the UK has been battling.

Where has the new strain come from?

The new variant emerged after the first wave of coronavirus at Nelson Mandela Bay, in South Africa’s Eastern Cape Province, and rapidly became the dominant strain in the area.

South Africa picked up the strain using genomic sequencing.

It was discovered in mid-December and is believed to have caused infections to soar from under 3,000 per day at the beginning of the month to over 9,000 by the end. 

Where else has the variant been found? 

Confirmed cases have been announced in France, Japan and Britain.

It is likely to be circulating in many more countries but only a select few nations have the genomic sequencing ability to be able to spot it when it’s present in low numbers. 

What has been done to tackle it?

Both of the people in the UK who had the new strain of the virus were quarantined, along with their close contacts.

Public Health England researchers are currently investigating the variant at their research laboratory at Porton Down in Wiltshire.

All flights to and from South Africa have been banned. 

What does it mean for the fight against the virus?

One mutation in the new strain, called N501Y, is thought to help the virus become more infectious – and spread more easily between people.

That means measures such as social distancing, wearing masks and avoiding unnecessary contacts have become more important.

What about the vaccine?

Dr Susan Hopkins, from Public Health England, told the Downing Street press conference there is no evidence the new strain may stop coronavirus vaccines from working.

Scientists will test the blood of those who have been vaccinated against coronavirus, or have recovered from it, to ensure they can fight off the new strain.

But Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at Oxford University, argued the strain was more concerning than the Kent one. He said it has ‘pretty substantial changes in the structure of the protein’, meaning vaccines could fail to work.