Boris Johnson Tightens U.K. Lockdown, Citing Fast-Spreading Version of Virus
The variant is up to 70 percent more transmissible than earlier versions, officials said, though some scientists are skeptical. People in southeast England, including London, were told to stay at home.
Prime Minster Boris Johnson announced a wholesale lockdown of London and southeast England on Saturday.
Prime Minster Boris Johnson announced a wholesale lockdown of London and southeast England on Saturday.Credit…Andrew Testa for The New York Times
Mark LandlerStephen Castle
By Mark Landler and Stephen Castle
Dec. 19, 2020Updated 3:17 p.m. ET
LONDON — Alarmed by a fast-spreading variant of the coronavirus, Prime Minister Boris Johnson abruptly reversed course on Saturday and imposed a wholesale lockdown on London and most of England’s southeast, banning Christmas-season gatherings beyond individual households.
The decision, which Mr. Johnson announced after an emergency meeting of his cabinet, came after the government got new evidence of a variant first detected several weeks ago in Southeast England, which the prime minister asserted was as much as 70 percent more transmissible than previous versions.
The new measures, which take effect on Sunday, are designed, in effect, to cut off the capital and its surrounding counties from the rest of England. They are the most severe measures the British government has taken since it imposed a lockdown on the country back in March, and reflect a fear that the new variant could supercharge the transmission of the virus as winter takes hold.
“When the virus changes its method of attack, we must change our method of defense,” a somber Mr. Johnson said on Saturday. “We have to act on information as we have it, because this is now spreading very fast.”
Viral mutations are not uncommon, and British officials said this variant had been detected in a handful of other countries, without naming them. But the government’s medical experts expressed alarm about its apparent infectiousness, noting that it now accounts for more than 60 percent of the new infections reported in London.
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Other scientists cautioned that the rapid spread of the variant did not necessarily mean that it was more transmissible, which can only be determined with certainty through laboratory experiments and other kinds of analysis. Its prevalence, they said, could be a result of other factors.
Whatever the characteristics of the mutation, it is clear that Britain faces an escalating crisis, even as it rolls out a mass vaccination program. Nationwide, the pace of new infections has nearly doubled in less than two weeks, leaping past most of western Europe, though it remains well below the per capita rate in the United States.
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Image“When the virus changes its method of attack, we must change our method of defense,” a somber Mr. Johnson said at a Saturday afternoon news conference.
“When the virus changes its method of attack, we must change our method of defense,” a somber Mr. Johnson said at a Saturday afternoon news conference.Credit…Pool photo by Toby Melville
Public health experts said the new variant reinforced the urgency to tighten restrictions to try to eliminate the virus altogether, since new mutations are a recurring phenomenon.
“Elimination is more and more optimal,” said Devi Sridhar, head of the global public health program at the University of Edinburgh. “More virus circulating means more variants and mutations.”
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Mr. Johnson’s abrupt reversal came after a cabinet meeting on Friday, in which a committee of the government’s scientific advisory panel presented evidence that new infections had nearly doubled in London in the last week, and that the new variant accounted for a majority of those cases.
The government’s chief scientific adviser, Patrick Vallance, said there was no evidence that this version of the virus was more lethal or more resistant to vaccines than others. But Dr. Vallance, a physician and medical researcher, said scientists had identified 23 changes in the new variant, an unusually large number, including several in the part of the virus that binds it to other cells. That, he said, could increase its transmissibility.
Faster transmission would mean more cases, which would lead to more hospitalizations and fatalities. The government said it had notified the World Health Organization about the prevalence of the new variant.
“This virus spreads more easily,” Dr. Vallance said, as he flanked Mr. Johnson, “and therefore more measures are needed to keep it under control.”
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The new lockdown zone includes all of Greater London and much of the surrounding southeast of the country, a densely populated area encompassing nearly 20 million people, a third of England’s population. The restrictions will remain in place for at least two weeks, and will be reviewed on Dec. 30.
The New York Times