'Supercharged' mutant coronavirus was detected in Brazil in April, say scientists

A Covid-19 mutation that is thought to have "supercharged" a new and highly-infectious variant of the virus in the UK was first detected in Brazil in the spring, say scientists.

Studies show the new variant, known as a N501Y mutation, was circulating in the South American country in April, in Australia between June and July, and in the US in July.

Up to 70 per cent more transmissible, the new variant is spreading rapidly in London and the South East, triggering Tier 4 lockdown restrictions in England and alarm across the world as countries such as France and India ban flights to and from the UK.

It may infect children slightly more effectively than the previous variants, say experts.

At least six other countries have recently detected one or more patients infected with the mutated strain. A case in Italy involves a man who flew from Britain to Rome in the last few days.

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The man travelled with his partner, who did not test positive, and they are now self-isolating, said Italy's health ministry.

There were at least nine instances of the strain in Denmark in the last month, and two in Australia in November.

Two travellers from the UK to Australia's New South Wales state were found carrying the mutated variant, said officials.

Both are in quarantine, and a recent spike in infections in Sydney are not linked to this, authorities said.

The Netherlands detected a case this month.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) on Saturday cited media reports that Belgium had spotted the strain in one of its citizens.

It also said a few cases have reported already by Iceland.

The ECDC concurred with the British Government that the new variant is "significantly more transmissible", but there is no evidence that infections are more severe.

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It has called on European governments to take measures prevent and control the spread of the new variant, and alert EU member states about new infections.

The mutation known as N501Y is thought to be up to 70% more infectious than regular Covid-19, perhaps by increasing the concentration of virus in the mouth and nose, the Telegraph reported.

It is one of of 23 separate mutations in the new strain, but it did not cause much alarm earlier this year because it did not spread as rapidly as it has in the UK in November and December.

However, experts now believe the "constellation" of mutations in the new strain, possibly driven by N501Y, could be the cause of the new variant's increased infectivity.

Scientists at the Government's COG-UK geonomics institute were already on the lookout for a the telltale mutation after they were alerted by colleagues in South Africa, who discovered a similarly alarming and highly-infectious new strain called 501.V2.

Andrew Rambaut, a professor of molecular evolution at the University of Edinburgh, who helped sequence the new strain for the COG-UK institute, told the Telegraph: "The hint to look for the N501Y came from [scientists] who were tracking this mutation in South Africa.

The variants in the UK and South Africa share the N501Y mutation, but appear to have evolved independently of one another.

In both countries, scientists suspect the new strains developed in a single patient who had likely been ill for months as their immune system struggled to fight off a mixed bag of the Covid-19the virus.

Professor Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London, a member of the Government's New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats advisory group (NervTag) said the new strain is spreading "much faster" than previous ones, and it may infect children slightly more effectively.

Asked about possible school closures in January, he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "So undoubtedly increased transmissibility limits our options for manoeuvre even more, and there is a hint from the data that this variant may infect children slightly more effectively than the previous variants, so it's very difficult to prove causality.

"I think what we'll see in the next two weeks though, whilst schools are closed, is probably all the variants of the virus in circulation at the moment declining, we'll be tracking very carefully whether we can see differences in that rate of decline and really it's the data which is being put together now and unfortunately over the Christmas break which is going to inform policy measures in January.

"It's just too early to tell. It is going to be difficult no doubt about that... but it's too early to say precisely what additional measures might be needed."

He added: "The faster we can get the vaccine into people's arms, the quicker we'll be able to, not go back completely to normal, but at least to be able to relax restrictions.

"The Government gets criticised for changing policy all the time, this virus is unpredictable, how people behave is unpredictable, and so we will track the epidemic as we always have done and policy will be formed on the basis of that.

"The tiers are reviewed every two weeks and will continue to be reviewed, but I certainly agree it's not looking optimistic right now."

Case numbers are rising much faster than the figures of the old viruses, he said.

The professor said: "The analysis we've collectively (been) undertaking in the last week has shown it would be very unlikely for this just to be a chance event; that there's a very, very strong correlation between the areas showing fastest growth in cases and this new variant.

"More than that, we can now with data... the fact that PCR testing behaves differently, we can track this variant actually at a much higher resolution and that shows that case numbers of this variant are growing much, much faster than case numbers of the old viruses."

Asked about the claim the PM was being "bounced by the science" into taking action, he added: "No, I think that's... new variants of viruses like this emerge all the time and evidence builds slowly.

"PHE and the geneticists brought it to NervTag, as I say 10 days ago, when there was enough evidence to be somewhat concerned and that evidence has firmed up considerably since then."

He added: "At no time did NervTag try to advise the Government 'you need to do this', we just presented the data as it was on the virus."

Another scientist advising the Government has said we should not "beat ourselves up" over the new strain of coronavirus evolving in the UK.

Calum Semple, professor of outbreak medicine at the University of Liverpool and a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said the challenge now is that the virus is infecting many more people in the amount of time than the previous variant did.

Speaking on Sky News, he said: "When it comes down to the genomic work on the virus and the research and understanding of how the disease is behaving, we are a world leader in this field.

"We shouldn't beat ourselves up about this evolving here.

"The fact is we've identified it, we've brought it to national attention, we've got the attention of the politicians and the World Health Organisation in very quick time."

He said it was too early to be sure how a vaccine will behave with the new strain, adding: "We do not yet have herd immunity despite those people that think herd immunity is going to be the salvation.

"We won't have it until a very large number of people have been vaccinated."