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ARCHIVED - Spanish Health Ministry carrying out survey to determine spread of the British Covid variant
Madrid says it has 48 confirmed cases and is also studying a possible case of the “South African “ variant
The latest central government coronavirus data issued on Thursday confirm the detection of 88 cases in Spain of the “British strain” of Covid-19 while between 150 and 200 other cases are still being analysed and are being treated as suspicious, according to Fernando Simón, the Director of the Coordination Centre for Health Alerts and Emergencies speaking at the Thursday presentation of the national covid figures.
Sr Simón added that whether the strain is becoming established in Spain, as it has done in Ireland and Denmark as well as England, cannot yet be determined, but for the time being the more contagious variant accounts for only a small minority of the new cases being reported. At present the strain is not having much impact in this country, he said, but it could do in the future.
In this sense he discards the theory that the mutation of the virus is a major factor in the rising case numbers in Spain, attributing the trend instead to the fact that “we enjoyed Christmas more than we should have done”: in other words, with the benefit of hindsight, the restrictions on social gatherings and travel were relaxed too much in order to allow people to meet over the festive season, comments for which he has been heavily criticised on Spanish social media sites.
But there is also a growing feeling amongst regional health authorities that the role potentially being played by the "British variant" is being played down and there are more cases of the more contagious “British variant” in circulation than is being publicly recognised, as cases are rising at unprecedented speed in several areas of the country, so for this reason the Ministry of Health announced on Friday that it would be carrying out a study involving “hundreds of tests” in order to try and sequence a cross-section of the cases currently circulating in Spain.
The first region to detect the mutation known as B.1.1.7 was Madrid, which notified the Health Ministry of the detection of four cases on December 26th. The origin of these four cases were two passengers who had flown from London. Five days later, the strain had reached another five autonomies and is now believed to be present in at least nine regions.
As of today, Madrid claims to have 48 cases, 19 have been found in Mallorca and 9 in Ibiza, both in the Balearic Islands, (the Department of Epidemiology of the Balearic health Authority believes that the new variant has been responsible for 5% of the new cases detected recently on the islands), Cantabria said yesterday that it believes 13% of cases detected in the region recently are of the British variant and has sent 82 “highly suspicious” samples to the laboratory for confirmation, on Wednesday the regional minister for health in the Andalucía region said that the “explosive” increase in new cases in his region was due to the new British variant, the Basque Country has confirmed 6, and Murcia 1.
So now Madrid, The Basque Country, the Valencia Region, Asturias, Galicia, Cantabria, Andalucia, Murcia, Extremadura the Balearic and the Canary Islands all have confirmed cases or suspect cases.
Hundreds more cases are being checked, but the problem currently faced is a lack of facilities in which to undertake genomic sequencing of the virus, something that is not possible to carry out in every part of the country.
Samples are currently being sent to the Majadahonda National Microbiology Center, in Madrid for analysis, but this is delaying the capacity of the authorities to react quickly and decisively when it is suspected that a case may be related to this new variant.
There are no national protocols for sending random samples for testing and the slow response when tests are sent, mean that the variant may be spreading in an area undetected and unchecked.
“Brazilian variant” and “South African variant” causing concern
There are two different types of Brazilian variants, only one of which is causing particular concern and is thought to be better at attaching to human cells, and therefore more infectious.
Madrid is checking one sample believed to be the “South African” variant brought into the capital by a man who contracted the virus in South-Africa and is now in hospital in Madrid.