Sabtu, 17 April 2021
Queen arrives at chapel for Prince Philip's funeral service - Sky News
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2021-04-17 14:21:42Z
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Prince Philip's coffin carried out of Windsor Castle - Sky News
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2021-04-17 13:51:07Z
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Fears new Covid variant could 'scupper' road map out of lockdown - Daily Record
A leading scientist has warned that a new variant of coronavirus could "scupper" the UK's road map out of lockdown as four cases are recorded in Scotland.
Recent figures have suggested that Covid-19 infections across the UK have dropped to the lowest level since the autumn, but despite this, Danny Altmann, professor of immunology at Imperial College, says Britain should be prepared for a third wave after 77 cases of another possible variant was recorded domestically.
The "B.1.617 variant" was first discovered in India and Public Health England reports 73 cases of the B.1.617 strain have been found, with a further four cases in Scotland.
He added the discovery of the Indian variant in the UK should warrant India being placed on the UK's "red list".
Officials have designated its version a variant under investigation (VUI) rather than a variant of concern (VOC), such as the Manaus (Brazil) or South African variants.
But Prof Altmann said he suspected the Indian mutation would be escalated to a variant of concern.
He said it holds properties that allow it to evade the coronavirus vaccines currently on offer and was more transmissible.
He told the BBC: "I think we should be terribly concerned about it.
"They (variants of concern) are things that can most scupper our escape plan at the moment and give us a third wave. They are a worry."
India recorded more than 217,000 daily cases on Friday, pushing its total since the pandemic began past 14.2 million as World Health Organisation director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said global Covid rates are "worrying".
Prof Altmann said he found it "mystifying" and "slightly confounding" that those flying in from India were not required to stay in a hotel.
India is not currently on the Government's "red list" for travel, which sees people who have been in those countries in the previous 10 days refused entry to the UK.
British or Irish nationals, or people with UK residency rights, are able to return from red list countries but must isolate in a quarantine hotel for 10 days.
A Downing Street spokesman said the Government's red list of travel ban countries is "under constant review", when asked why India did not feature on it.
Downing Street has insisted Boris Johnson's trip to India later this month will go ahead but will be slightly shorter than the original four-day planned trip.
British officials hope the Prime Minister's visit will kickstart trade talks with India.
According to the latest estimates from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), around one in 480 people in private households in England had Covid-19 in the week to April 10 - the lowest figure since the week to September 19 last year.
Infection rates in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland followed a similar trend of depreciating numbers, ONS data showed.
Professor Altmann said that as a result, those arriving into the country from India should be subject to a hotel quarantine if the UK is to shut out variants that could set back the Prime Minister's lockdown easing plans.
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2021-04-17 08:25:45Z
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COVID-19: Indian variant could 'scupper' easing of UK coronavirus lockdown rules, warns expert - Sky News
The Indian coronavirus mutation could "scupper" the UK's march to freedom, a leading scientist has warned.
It comes despite the lockdown and vaccine programme leading to cases falling to a seven-month low.
COVID-19 infections across the UK dropped to the lowest level since the autumn, according to the latest figures.
But a professor of immunology has said the country should be on its guard against a third wave of coronavirus after 77 cases of the B.1.617 variant, which was first discovered in India, were found.
Imperial College's Danny Altmann said the discovery of the Indian variant should warrant the country being placed on the UK's "red list" meaning incoming travellers arriving should be subject to a hotel quarantine.
However, officials have designated it as a variant under investigation (VUI) rather than a variant of concern.
And Downing Street has insisted Boris Johnson's trip to India later this month - his first major international visit since securing a Brexit trade deal with Brussels - will go ahead.
"I think we should be terribly concerned about it," Prof Altmann told BBC News.
"They (variants of concern) are things that can most scupper our escape plan at the moment and give us a third wave. They are a worry."
Prof Altmann said he found it "mystifying" and "slightly confounding" that those flying in from India were not required to quarantine in a hotel.
Meanwhile, the group advising ministers on vaccine deployment has recommended that pregnant women should be offered a COVID-19 jab at the same time as the rest of the population.
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) had previously only recommended that jabs be offered to pregnant women when their risk of exposure to the virus is high, such as health workers, or if a woman has underlying health conditions.
The development coincided with a continuing decline in coronavirus infections across Britain.
But the fall marked a contrast to rising case rates in other parts of the world.
World Health Organisation (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said coronavirus rates globally were "worrying", as India recorded more than 217,000 daily cases on Friday, pushing its total since the pandemic began past 14.2 million.
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2021-04-17 07:51:23Z
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Jumat, 16 April 2021
Covid: Boris Johnson's India visit to go ahead despite rise in cases - BBC News
Boris Johnson's visit to India will still go ahead later this month despite the country's soaring coronavirus cases and a new variant there, No 10 says.
Public Health England says 73 cases of the variant first identified in India have been found in England and four in Scotland.
Officials have called it a "variant under investigation" rather than "of concern".
The PM had already scaled down his trip due to India's rising number of cases.
The country has reported more than 150,000 Covid cases a day for the past three weeks.
Speaking about the prime minister's visit to India, a No 10 spokesman said the trip was already "slightly shorter than it will have been".
Mr Johnson was due to spend four days in the south Asian country but after talks with Narendra Modi's administration, the "bulk" of meetings will take place on one day - Monday, 26 April.
"As you would expect, safety is obviously important and is a priority for us on this trip, which is why we will make sure that all elements of the visit are Covid-secure," the spokesman said.
Public Health England has designated the B.1.617 variant as a "variant under investigation" and said there was currently no evidence to suggest it caused more severe disease or that vaccines were less likely to work against it.
Officials said "all appropriate public health interventions will be undertaken, including enhanced contact tracing" after its detection, with PHE and international partners monitoring the situation "closely".
Analysis: What do we know about the Indian variant?
By Philippa Roxby, health reporter, BBC News
Viruses mutate all the time in a bid to survive. The challenge for scientists is to work out which mutations change how the coronavirus behaves.
Do they alter how the virus spreads, for example, do they cause people to become more seriously ill, and could they evade the protection of vaccines?
These are all questions experts will now try to answer about the Indian variant by carrying out experiments in the lab and looking at data on cases in the real world.
So far, we know that it has two mutations - the first, E484Q is similar to one found in the Brazilian, South African and Kent variants - and the second, L452R has been found in a variant in California.
That means it could be a concern based on what is known about those variants already.
But the "double mutation" on its own isn't unusual and has been found in other variants.
Covid vaccines are still very effective at reducing the risk of serious illness and manufacturers plan to update their vaccines in response to the most worrying new variants.
Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, said the variant first identified in India featured two "escape mutations" which "are causing people to be concerned".
"If you think about where the main variants have arisen - South Africa, the UK, California, Brazil, and now India - all of these are countries that have really struggled to keep case numbers down," Prof Hunter said.
"So it's not surprising. India has got a huge pandemic, and therefore that's where you're going to be getting the variant."
Coronavirus cases have risen sharply in India in the past few weeks as the country battles a second wave.
There have been more than 13.9 million confirmed coronavirus cases in India and 172,000 people have died.
The country is not on the UK government's "red list" for travel. This refuses entry to people who have been in those countries in the previous 10 days and means a 10-day hotel quarantine for British or Irish nationals, or people with UK residency rights, returning.
Asked why India had not been put on the red list, Downing Street said the situation was "under constant review".
"We add and remove countries based on the latest scientific data and public health advice from a range of world-leading experts," a spokesman said.
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2021-04-16 15:30:56Z
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UK finds more cases of variant linked to severe second wave in India - Financial Times
Seventy-seven cases of a new variant linked to a surge in Covid-19 cases in India have been found in the UK, as the government seeks to fortify its defences against strains that may be able to evade existing vaccines.
The cases were reported by the government on Thursday evening, along with 56 new cases of the variant first identified in South Africa, taking the total confirmed cases since it was first detected in the UK to 600.
Earlier this week health authorities stepped up surge testing for the variant discovered in South Africa in four London boroughs, and on Friday it extended it to areas in Birmingham and Sandwell.
The B.1.617 variant, first identified in India, is currently classified by UK health authorities as a “variant under investigation” not a “variant of concern”, like P.1 from Brazil and 501Y.V2 from South Africa, but worries have grown about the strain in recent weeks as the virus has spread rapidly across regions of India.
It was first detected in the UK on February 22, according to genomic sequencing databases in the UK, and some scientists are worried that it appears to be more infectious and more resistant to the body’s immune response than other variants that were in circulation in India.
The country is suffering from a devastating second wave of Covid-19, with its caseload far surpassing last year’s pandemic peak and a vaccine rollout sputtering.
India is not currently on the UK’s “red list” for travel which requires visitors returning to Britain to quarantine in a hotel for 10 days.
Christina Pagel, professor of operational research at University College London and a member of Independent Sage, a group convened as an alternative to the government’s top scientific advisory group, called on the government to place India on the list.
The government said on Friday that it was keeping the list “under constant review” and “won’t hesitate to introduce tougher restrictions and add countries if we think it is necessary”.
B.1.617 has two mutations around the spike protein, which the virus uses to enter human cells, although they are slightly different to the ones seen in P.1 and 501Y.V2.
The first mutation to the spike is called E484Q, which is different but in a similar location to a concerning mutation called E484K found in several variants of concern. Scientists are investigating whether this mutation has a similar impact on the virus’s ability to infect human hosts.
Downing Street said that despite the new variant outbreaks it remained confident in its road map for easing coronavirus restrictions in England. From April 12 pubs and restaurants with outdoor facilities have been permitted to reopen and personal care services such as hairdressers and nail salons allowed to start up again.
“The PM has said before that he sees nothing in the data to suggest that we can’t move at the pace that the road map has set out,” a spokesperson said. “We set out at the time, the four tests that we would continue to look at as we move through the road map.”
The latest coronavirus infection data is likely to bolster confidence in the government’s decision.
According to the weekly Office for National Statistics survey, coronavirus infections have dropped across all regions of the UK. In England, an estimated 112,600 people tested positive for Covid-19 in the week ending April 10, equating to around 1 in 480 people, down from 1 in 340 people the week before.
Rates of infection decreased in every age group except for secondary school children and those aged 50 to 69, where the trend was harder to ascertain.
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2021-04-16 16:10:12Z
CAIiEMlIGo0Q875nWFCHNUW9vuMqGAgEKg8IACoHCAow-4fWBzD4z0gw_fCpBg
Prince Philip: Prince Edward and Sophie read tributes left with thousands of flowers at Windsor ahead of Duke of Edinburgh's funeral - Sky News
The Earl and Countess of Wessex have been to view the flowers and tributes left at Windsor ahead of Prince Philip's funeral on Saturday.
It comes after the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall visited Marlborough House in central London to see the tributes gathered there.
Prince Edward, the youngest son of the Duke of Edinburgh and the Queen, and his wife Sophie were in Windsor the day ahead of his father's funeral.
The couple viewed the flowers outside St George's Chapel, which is within the walls of Windsor Castle.
They were joined by their daughter, Lady Louise Windsor, 17.
While reading through letters from children, Sophie could be heard saying "how sweet" before turning to her husband.
Among the tributes were those sent by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and the Royal Navy.
Prince Philip served in the navy in the Second World War, and was associated with it for most of his life.
The public have been urged not to head to the Berkshire town on Saturday, as the funeral proceedings will be taking place entirely within the castle perimeter.
Only 30 people will be attending the funeral service inside the chapel due to COVID restrictions.
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Prince Philip died a week ago on 9 April, at the age of 99.
He was married to the Queen for more than 70 years, with their wedding taking place at Westminster Abbey in 1947.
The day after his death, Sophie told Sky's royal correspondent Rhiannon Mills how "the Queen has been amazing" following the passing of Prince Philip.
Under plans first outlined in 1999, Prince Edward will eventually take on the title of Duke of Edinburgh.
Earlier this week he paid tribute to his father, and thanked those who had taken part in the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme for their kind words.
Edward said: "Reading just some of the wonderful memories you have shared about your experiences of the Duke of Edinburgh's Award and, in some cases, of meeting my father, has been truly uplifting.
"I think I may have said once that he was a man that once met, never forgotten. He had a unique ability to make a lasting impression in a remarkably short time.
"I, like all my family, have a lifetime of lasting impressions, inspiration, shared passions and love. He may have departed this world, but his spirit and ethos lives on through his award, through each and every life touched, transformed, inspired; then, now and in the future.
"Thank you one and all for helping to create such an extraordinary tribute."
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2021-04-16 15:11:15Z
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