One of South Africa’s leading epidemiologists, Professor Salim Abdool Karim, has warned that the high rate of viral transmissions in Britain in the absence of Covid restrictions poses the risk of a new variant emerging and becoming a global threat.
According to News24, Karim said the biggest concern for scientists around the world was countries that had eased restrictions, despite high levels of viral transmissions, like the United Kingdom.
‘When the virus is spreading in an uncontrolled way in any country, we are all anxious. There is always a concern that we are always dependent on what is going on at a global level.’
Karim, who is an internationally renowned scientist, added: ‘The UK is one of our biggest concerns right now. The UK has no restrictions at all, no mask wearing, no distancing, nothing and they have reached over 100 000 cases a day [recently]…’
The worry was that a new variant was likely to arise under such conditions.
News24 reports that more than six million people have died so far from the coronavirus outbreak across the globe.