“We have been informed that, in addition to spreading faster, there is evidence that the new variant … is more associated with a higher mortality rate,” Johnson told a news conference on Friday.
“Both of the vaccines we currently use remain effective against the old variant and this new variant,” he added.
Vallance said patients admitted to the hospital with the new variant do not appear to be at higher risk of dying compared to those hospitalized with the original form of the virus.
However, if one looks at data in terms of … anyone who has tested positive, there is evidence that there is an increased risk for those who have the new variant compared to the old [one.]”
Vallance added that the evidence was not yet strong and that the data remained uncertain.
“If you took a man in his 60s, the average risk is that about 1,000 people who are infected would expect about 10 to die unhappily from the virus. 13 or 14 people can be expected to die, ‘he said on Friday.
Vallance added: “This is the kind of change for the kind of age group, an increase of 10 to 13 or 14 out of 1,000 and you will see that there is a similar relative increase in risk in the different age groups as well.”
The new variant was first detected in south-east England and is thought to be between 30 and 70% more transmissible than the previous one, Vallance said.
The United Kingdom has recorded another 1,401 coronavirus-related deaths in the past 24 hours, government data showed on Friday – compared to the daily increase of 1,299 deaths.
The total number of people in the country who died within 28 days after a positive test now stands at 95,981.
Vallance said on Friday that there was “increasing evidence” that the existing Covid-19 vaccines would work against the British strain, but it was a warning about the variants found in Brazil and South Africa.
“We are more concerned that they have certain characteristics, which means they are less susceptible to vaccines,” he said, although he added that researchers need “more clinical information” about the variants.
The chief medical officer for England, Chris Whitty, said on Friday that there were ‘clear signs of improvement’ in the number of people infected with coronavirus in England, as well as in hospital admissions.
The number of new Covid-19 infections registered in the UK in the last 24 hours is also according to the figure on Thursday. A total of 40,261 additional cases have been confirmed, bringing the total number of cases in the UK since the pandemic started to 3,583,907.
Public Health England continued to call on citizens to comply with the government’s guidance and again warned on Friday that ‘not everyone with coronavirus shows symptoms’ and called on people to stay home.
The UK remains under strict lockdown.