UK warns more deadly tensions make closure harder

Photographer: Leon Neal / Getty Images

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said the UK’s new coronavirus could be more deadly than first thought, while reiterating that the country faces a long wait before it can come out of the closure.

The prime minister said at a news conference in London on Friday that new evidence had led the government to reconsider its original view that the variant was more contagious, but not more dangerous. It could be 30% more deadly than the original tribe – or more, a government analysis has found.

“Apart from spreading faster, it also appears that there is evidence that the new variant – the variant first identified in London and the South East – may be associated with higher mortality,” Johnson said from 10 Downing Street, flanked by its top medical advisers.

The government said an average of 13,000 to 1,000 men would die in their 60s if they contracted the new variant, compared to 10 for the initial strain.

The prime minister’s warning comes as Britain struggles with the highest death toll in Europe and fights to recover from the economic wreckage of its deepest recession in more than 300 years.

There was a light for the UK in government data on Friday indicating that the second wave of the pandemic has reached its peak.

But Johnson and his scientific advisers were clear that the number of hospitalizations, deaths and infections remained far too high and that it would not allow the restrictions that hampered businesses to be lifted soon.

More vigilance

In addition, the warning about the increased strength of the new variant was known as B.1.1.7, which was first identified in the UK last year and has since spread around the world.

Read more: Why new virus strains are so worrying: Quick recording

Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, said the new strain could not only be transferred more easily, but was also linked to higher mortality rates than the earlier variants circulating in Britain.

“It’s largely the impact of this new variant that means the NHS is under such intense pressure,” Johnson said. “It is more important than ever that we all remain vigilant and follow the rules.” There are 38,562 Covid patients in hospitals, which is 78% higher than during the first peak last April, he said.

While an initial analysis by English Public Health experts found that the variant was not linked to more hospitalizations or deaths, independent investigations by outside experts, according to the government, yielded consistent, worrying results. report.

The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and Imperial College London have found that the mortality rate was 29% to 35% higher in those infected with the variant of concern, or VOC, compared to those who had the original strain of the virus had. The University of Exeter concluded that the risk was 91% higher, while a repeat analysis of Public Health England found 65% higher deaths.

“There is a realistic probability that infection with VOC B.1.1.7 is associated with an increased risk of death compared to infection with non-VOC viruses,” the report from the UK Government’s New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group concluded. “It must be noticed that the absolute risk of death per infection remains low. ”

The group will accumulate more data in the coming weeks – as deaths cause infections – which could make the analysis more powerful.

Officials from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention attended to learn more about the situation, but had not yet seen the data or spoken to British counterparts, an agency spokesman said in an email Friday said.

In other developments Friday:

• Johnson promised to do “Whatever is needed” to support jobs as summer restrictions continue
• He warned that stricter border controls should be put in place to keep mutant tribes out of the UK
• Officials proposed people pay to stay home in an effort to encourage more compliance with self-isolation orders
• Data suggested lock up work and the pandemic may no longer spread exponentially in the UK
• A further 1,401 deaths were reported in the last 24 hours, bringing the UK total to 95,981

The prime minister is under pressure from his own Conservative party to set out his plan road map to lift restrictions that have damaged the economy over the past year.

He pinned the government’s hopes on a strategy to immunize 15 million of the most vulnerable people by February 15 – and said again on Friday that the country was on track to reach the target.

There is no evidence that the vaccines being deployed in Britain are less effective against the more deadly variant of the virus, Johnson said. But infection rates remain high, with an average of one in 35 people in London having the disease, and the figure is one in 55 nationally.

“We really can not begin to unlock it until we are sure that the vaccination program is working,” Johnson said. “We need to be in a position where the rates are not so high that an unlocking will lead to another major setback.”

– With help from David Goodman, Michelle Fay Cortez and John Tozzi

(Updates with US CDC commentary in the 15th paragraph)