A leading German virologist on Monday downplayed fears about the new mutation of the coronavirus spreading across the UK – and questioned Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s claim that the species is 70 percent more contagious, according to reports.
“I wonder if a scientist gave an estimate, maybe asked what he would say if he had to give a figure, and then it takes on a life of its own,” said Christian Drosten, the Daily Mail reported.
“Then it gets into politics and politicians use this figure and the media picks it up. Suddenly there is a figure – 70 percent – and no one even knows what it means, ”he told Deutschlandfunk radio, the UK outlet reported.
“The fact that top politicians are reciting scientific content to the media saying that a mutation has taken place and that the cases are increasing here and there and so on – that’s unusual,” added the director of virology at Charite Hospital in Berlin.
Drosten also said it was unclear whether the spike in Kent and Southeast cases was even caused by the new species, N501Y.
He said the new variant may have just “surfaced” during a resurgence in cases that could have happened for other reasons.
“The question is, was it the virus to blame, or was it just that in the area where this virus was located … there were methods of transmission that would have brought another virus to the surface?” he said, the Daily Mail reported.
The virology expert noted that British scientists had not said with certainty that the new strain was more contagious.
“If you want to know whether a virus is more transmissible, you have to look at pairs of infected people. You should see who infected who and how long it took, ”said Drosten.
Germany is one of more than a dozen European countries that have closed their borders to flights from the UK because of the mutated strain – but Drosten said the new variant was likely already in his country.
“We know it’s already in Italy, in the Netherlands, in Belgium, in Denmark, and even in Australia,” he said, adding that he was “not too concerned” about the mutated bug, noting that none of those countries have a increase. in related cases.
“I am open to new scientific insights and in science there are always surprises, but in this respect I am anything but concerned,” Drosten told the German outlet, according to the British Guardian.
On Sunday, the Dutch government confirmed that a case of the new mutation had been diagnosed in the country in early December, suggesting it has been there for a while, the outlet reported.
So far, it doesn’t seem to be spreading as quickly in the Netherlands as it does in the UK, Ab Osterhaus, emeritus professor of virology at Erasmus University in Rotterdam, told Algemeen Dagblad, The Guardian reported.
“In areas where the number of infections is increasing particularly rapidly, it is often linked to the mutation,” said Ostarhaus. “But I don’t know at all whether that is right.”
Experts insist there was no evidence that vaccines – including the Pfizer-BioNTech injection deployed in Britain – do not protect against the new variant, Reuters reported.
The discovery of the new strain came just months before vaccines are expected to be widely available, as the pandemic killed about 1.7 million people worldwide and more than 67,000 in Britain.
The countries that have suspended travel from the UK are Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Spain and Switzerland.