U.K. : 17% rise in Covid19 cases from last week due to Delta variant
The United Kingdom on Friday registered 36,800 cases of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) due to the Delta Covid-19 variant, data issued by Public Health England (PHE) showed. With this, the total number of Covid-19 cases in the UK due to the Delta variant, first detected in India last year, has risen to 253,049 from 216,249 in the previous week, or a rise of 17%, the data showed.
The latest statistics come as a separate study revealed on Thursday that almost 100 per cent of people tested positive for antibodies 14 or more days after their second COVID-19 vaccine dose of either Pfizer/BioNTech or Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, being administered in India as Covishield. Imperial College London and Ipsos MORI said their latest antibody surveillance report highlights the importance of getting both doses for the best possible protection against coronavirus as lockdown restrictions are eased from next Monday.
UK Prime Minister’s Boris Johnson’s plan to lift almost all restrictions from Monday amid a raging pandemic is a threat to the world and could lead to the emergence of deadly variants capable of evading vaccine-induced immunity, international experts have warned.
Deepti Gurdasani, a clinical epidemiologist and senior lecturer in machine learning at Queen Mary University, expressed shock at Boris Johnson’s statement that suggested proceeding with the reopening. Gurdasani said that the government is implicitly accepting that the National Health Service (NHS) will come under immense pressure with thousands of hospitalisations and around 100-200 deaths per day during the peak of the pandemic.
