South Africa detects Indian, UK virus variants

JOHANNESBURG

A variant of COVID-19 first found in India has been detected in South Africa, the country’s health minister confirmed late on Saturday.

Zweli Mkhize said the Network for Genomic Surveillance in South Africa (NGS-SA) confirmed that two variants of concern have been detected.

The minister said 11 cases of the B.1.1.7 variant first detected in the UK and four cases of the B.1.617.2 variant first detected in India were found in the country.

Mkhize said two cases of the Indian variant were detected in Gauteng province which includes capital Pretoria and the largest city of Johannesburg. Two others were found in KwaZulu-Natal province.

He said all the four cases had a history of recent arrival from India. “All cases have been isolated and managed according to national COVID-19 case management guidelines and contact tracing has been performed in order to limit the spread of this variant,’’ he said.

Mkhize said eight cases of the UK variant were detected in the tourist hotspot of Western Cape with two having a history of travel from Bahrain. Two others were detected in Gauteng and one in KwaZulu-Natal province.

The minister said the UK variant has been detected in community samples and this therefore suggests that its community transmission has already set in.

“It is important to emphasize that variants can develop at any time in any country so they do not have to be imported,’’ the minister stated.

He appealed for calm saying there is no need for panic, as the fundamentals of the public health response such as testing, contact tracing, isolation and quarantine have not changed.

Mkhize said the findings are urgently being processed by the government and announcements pertaining to travel regulations will be made after all appropriate consultations have been undertaken by Cabinet.

“Travel restrictions will need to be balanced against the scientific realities in order to protect the economy,’’ he said.

South Africa bears the largest burden of COVID-19 infections and deaths on the continent. There are currently 1.59 million cases of COVID-19 in the country with 54,724 deaths reported in the rainbow nation.