London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Thursday, Oct 09, 2025

The U.K. has identified a new Covid-19 strain that spreads more quickly. Here's what they know

The U.K. has identified a new Covid-19 strain that spreads more quickly. Here's what they know

So far, there's no evidence to suggest the new strain causes more severe disease or affects Covid treatments and vaccines, England's top medical officer said.


Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson attends a virtual press conference inside 10 Downing Street in central London on Nov. 26, 2020.

England’s top medical officer on Saturday announced that the U.K. has identified a new variant of the coronavirus that “can spread more quickly” than prior strains of the virus, leading Prime Minister Boris Johnson to impose fresh restrictions on parts of the nation to control its spread.

“We’re learning about it as we go, but we already know enough, more than enough, to be sure that we must act now,” Johnson said during a press briefing on Saturday where he laid out fresh restrictions on London and other parts of England ahead of the Christmas holiday.

“When the virus changes its method of attack, we must change our method of defense,” Johnson said.

The U.K. government announced the new coronavirus strain on Monday following an increase in cases in the southern and eastern parts of England. Just over 1,100 Covid-19 cases with the new variant had been identified as of Sunday, according to a statement from Public Health England.

Now, it’s thought that the new strain could be up to 70% more transmissible than the original strain of the disease, Johnson said on Saturday, adding that it appears to be driving the rapid spread of infections. Johnson called on residents to refrain from traveling and “stay local” to prevent the new strain from moving around the country and abroad.

The United Kingdom is reporting roughly 24,061 new Covid-19 cases every day, based on a weekly average, which is a more than 40% increase compared with a week ago, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

“This is early data, and it’s subject to review, but it’s the best that we have at the moment and we have to act on information as we have it because this is now spreading very fast,” Johnson said.

Professor Chris Whitty, England’s chief medical officer, said at the press briefing that “viruses mutate all the time.” Seasonal influenza mutates every year, and there have already been other new variants of the coronavirus identified in countries like Spain, according to Public Health England.

What needs to be answered is whether the new strain transmits more easily, makes people sicker and whether it changes the way someone’s immune system responds to the virus if they were already infected or vaccinated, Whitty said.

So far, a collection of evidence from genetic, frequency and laboratory studies suggests the new strain “has a significant, substantial increase in transmissibility,” Whitty said. However, there’s no evidence so far to suggest that the new strain causes a higher death rate.

Health officials believe the new variant first appeared in mid-September in London or Kent, and by the middle of November it’s thought to have caused roughly 28% of cases in London and other parts of southeast England, Whitty said.

Now those figures are much higher, he said. In London, data over the past week suggests the new variant has accounted for more than 60% of new cases, Whitty said.

“So what this tells us is that this new variant not only moves fast, it is increased in its ability to transmit, but it’s becoming the dominant variant. It is beating all the others in terms of transmission,” he said.

Yet there’s “no evidence” it causes a more severe disease, more hospitalizations or “more trouble than the other virus,” Whitty said. While there are reasons to suspect the new variant might alter someone’s immune response to the disease, there’s nothing to indicate that’s the case so far, he said.

“Our working assumption at the moment, from all of the scientists, is that the vaccine response should be adequate for this virus,” he said. “That obviously needs to be looked at going forward, and we need to keep vigilant about this.”

The U.K. has alerted the World Health Organization and will continue to analyze data on the new strain.


Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×