FOUR cases of a India's 'double mutant' strain of coronavirus have been detected in Scotland for the first time.
New figures from Public Health England show that 73 cases of the variant, known as B.1.617, have been identified in England with a further four in Scotland.
The variant is characterised by two distinct mutations on its spike protein which are believed to make it more infectious, and potentially more resistant to vaccines.
The discovery of 77 cases of the variant in the UK has raised questions about why the India has not been added to the 'red list' of countries which required travellers to complete a 10-day supervised quarantine in hotels.
Scotland requires all international arrivals to isolate in hotels, but this can be avoided if passengers coming from non-red list countries catch connecting flights via airports in other parts of the UK or Ireland first.
They would still be required to self-isolate, but can do so at home instead.
Professor Devi Sridhar, chair of global public health and a member of the Scottish Government advisor group on Covid-19, said this showed "why the red list approach just doesn’t work from a public health perspective".
READ MORE: Sudden spike in Covid hospital admissions among under-45s
Deepti Gurdasani, a senior lecturer in epidemiology at Queen Margaret University London (QMUL), tweeted: "Not only do we are we continuing to see rises of the so-called South Africa variant, despite efforts to contain it, we also seem to have imported the double mutant from India - with *77* cases identified so far.
"When were these identified? And why isn't the govt acting?"
The Indian variant was reportedly first detected in England in February and cases are now said to be dispersed across England, with many linked to travel.
Details of the location and circumstances behind the cases in Scotland are unknown at this stage.
Dr Anthony Costello, a member of Independent SAGE (Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies), said: "This is a disaster. We have more than 50 flights from India daily. Seventy-seven cases of a really nasty India variant that affects younger people already here?
"Surge testing without isolation support. Contacts not being tested. This is a total shambles. We have learnt nothing after a year."
The Indian variant is characterised by two mutations, known as L452R and E484Q, which have never before being found occurring together in the same variant.
India's Health Ministry said in March that the combined mutations "confer immune escape and increased infectivity".
India has experienced a massive surge in Covid cases in recent months and on Thursday recorded more than 200,000 new infections in a single day - the highest in the world.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel