Maria Laura Avignolo
03/01/2021 10:52
Clarín.com
World
Updated 03/01/2021 10:52
Britain is searching for a
missing patient
of the Manaus variant of the coronavirus, which can spread rapidly in the kingdom and no one knows where it is.
The patient would have arrived before the mandatory quarantine system was installed in hotels and no one knows where he lives.
At least six positive cases of this variant have been found in the kingdom.
This
Authorities are seeking to find people who were traveling on Swissair flight LX318 from São Paulo.
Photo: AFP
Anyone who has taken a Covid test on February 12 or 13 should now contact a helpline, if they did not get the results or think they did not provide the contact details.
Health officials are searching for
a mystery Covid patient
, believed to be one of the first in the UK to have a Brazilian variant, which may spread more quickly and respond less to vaccines.
His nationality
is not known
until now.
Six people infected with the "worrying variant" have been detected in the UK, authorities said Sunday night.
Public Health England (PHE) has admitted that
it has no idea who
one of them is or where the test was done.
Health officials have started a tough investigation to try to find the person and track hundreds of passengers on a series of connecting flights to the UK from Brazil earlier this month.
PHE is particularly concerned about this Brazilian variant, called P1, because its mutations share the hallmark of a South African variant that is less responsive to Covid vaccines.
The variant was first detected circulating in Manaus, northern Brazil, in December.
The result in the city was a health catastrophe, with overflowing hospitals and
without
enough
oxygen
for patients.
There were two waves.
Outside of Brazil, it had only been detected in travelers going to Japan so far.
The Manaus variant is also believed to be more contagious than the original Covid strain, similar to the Kent strain, which prompted an increase in cases in Britain in recent months.
Now the British variant has spread to France, where it is the majority.
A second less worrisome variant of Brazil, called P2, was found in the UK in January.
Two of the cases of the Manaus variant in England are in South Gloucestershire, where two contacts within the same household have tested positive for Covid.
But they await the results of genetic sequencing to determine if they have the new variant.
In this case, all the contacts have been identified.
Upon their return from Brazil, they were not required to quarantine at the hotel because it was not established until February 15.
Health officials said they will deploy "tests" in five areas of the county in order to look for more infections and increase the number of positive cases that are sequenced.
The third case in England is believed to be unrelated.
Health officials said an investigation is underway to find the person who tested positive for the variant, as they did not complete their test registration card.
They admitted that
they had no idea
where the person might be in the country.
Test station in London.
Photo: EFE
It could be more likely that they had undergone a home test for the virus, because officials at testing centers are supposed to verify that contact details are submitted.
The events provoked criticism of the government's policies.
The Labor Party demanded urgent investigations into why the cases were not detected more quickly.
Three cases
have also been found
in Scotland
and involve people who returned from Brazil via Paris and then London before taking a flight to Aberdeen.
Officials learned of the English cases on Friday and the Scots on Saturday.
The Scottish government said it would track passengers on this flight but declined to say when it would be, citing patient confidentiality.
The cases are not believed to be related to the three confirmed cases in England.
All passengers on both flights should have been quarantined at home for 10 days.
The World Health Organization has been informed of the cases.
Dr Susan Hopkins, PHE Director of Strategic Response for Covid-19, said: "We have identified these cases thanks to the UK's advanced sequencing capabilities. Which means we are finding more variants and mutations than many other countries and Therefore, we can act quickly, ”he said.
"The important thing to remember is that Covid-19, no matter what variant it is,
spreads in the same way
. That means that the measures to stop its spread do not change," he described.
Labor MP Yvette Cooper, who chairs the Commons home affairs committee, said: "This worrying development shows the weaknesses in the Government's Covid border measures."
The Brazilian variant was first identified a month before one of these cases occurred on February 10 and many weeks after the prime minister was warned that
indirect flights
were a problem.
But the government delayed the implementation of stricter measures, the former Labor minister said.
She put the quarantine in hotels under the magnifying glass.
He said there were
too many holes
in the current hotel quarantine system, which only covers one percent of travelers.
"We urgently need to know how all these cases have arrived in the country and why they were not prevented or not detected upon arrival. So that lessons can be learned quickly and policies are changed to protect the vaccine program from the arrival of more cases, "he asked.
Paul Charles, executive director of the travel consultancy The PC Agency, said: "This calls into question the border measures that the government claimed were waterproof to prevent the entry of variants. That is why only
tests on arrival
will be successful. to prevent the arrival of variants in the United Kingdom ".
Paris, correspondent
ap