Scientists have said that a small cluster of the new coronavirus strain has been found in the northwest of England.
Susan Hopkins, who works at Public Health England, said: “We have a small hotspot that we’re tracking at the moment in Cumbria.”
“It’s a very small number of cases and they sequence very small amounts, so there’s not very much reliable around that estimate, but we have been speaking to the local team and asking them to investigate further,” she added.
– Switzerland believes new Covid strain is circulating there
After banning travel from the UK, Swiss officials expressed fears that the new coronavirus strain has already reached their country.
Like many other countries, Switzerland is no longer accepting British travellers because the UK is the global hotspot for the new Covid-19 variant, which is thought to be highly-contagious.
Patrick Mathys, assistant head of communicable disease at the Swiss health ministry, said: “The virus, unfortunately, is one step ahead of us again,”
“We know too little about the coronavirus, and we know even less about this mutant form. But there are reliable signs emerging that it is more infectious,” he added.
Switzerland is considering whether to roll out mass testing for thousands of Britons in its popular tourist destinations, including the ski resort Verbier.
