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Two more patients in England test positive for coronavirus Coronavirus: UK schools and offices could close for up to two months
(about 7 hours later)
Patients caught virus in Italy and Tenerife, Department of Health says Chief medical officer says onward transmission within the UK is ‘just a matter of time’
Two further patients in England have tested positive for coronavirus, bringing the total number of UK cases to 15, the Department of Health said on Thursday. Schools and offices could be closed for two months with major sporting events and other mass gatherings banned for a similar period if the coronavirus outbreak in the UK intensifies, England’s chief medical officer has warned.
The virus was passed on in Italy and Tenerife, and the patients have been transferred to specialists at the Royal Liverpool hospital and the Royal Free hospital, London, said the Department of Health (DoH). Prof Chris Whitty said that if Covid-19 did spread in the UK, it would have a heavy “social cost”.
Addressing health professionals at the Nuffield Trust Summit in Windsor on Thursday, he said: “One of the things that’s really clear with this virus, much more so than flu, is that anything we do we’re going to have to do for quite a long period of time, probably more than two months.
“The implications of that are non-trivial, so we need to think that through carefully. This is something we face as really quite a serious problem for society potentially if this goes out of control. It may not, but if it does globally, then we may have to face that.”
Whitty said that onward transmission in the UK was “just a matter of time in my view”, adding that the country’s only hope of containing it was if it did not become a global epidemic. “If it is not containable, it will be non-containable everywhere, and then it is coming our way,” he said.
His remarks came as Public Health England (PHE) said it had sent a health protection specialist to the H10 Costa Adeje Palace hotel in Tenerife where four former guests tested positive for the virus and 168 Britons are among more than 700 people who have been placed in quarantine.
Yvonne Doyle, PHE’s medical director, said the aim of the move, which comes after complaints about inaction by the UK government, was “to better understand the public health measures that have been put in place in the hotel. This includes understanding spread of the virus within the hotel and how the Spanish authorities are monitoring the situation.”
A spokesman for the regional government in the Canary Islands said on Thursday that 130 guests at the hotel had been cleared to leave and none of those remaining had tested positive so far. It was reported that the 130 allowed to leave were of 11 different nationalities. The Foreign Office was unable to confirm immediately whether any Britons were among those who could soon be flying home.
Two further patients in England have tested positive for coronavirus, bringing the total number of UK cases to 15, the Department of Health said on Thursday. The virus was passed on in Italy and Tenerife, and the patients have been transferred to specialists at the Royal Liverpool hospital and the Royal Free hospital, London.
Of the 13 people in the UK who had previously tested positive for Covid-19, eight have been discharged from hospital. Four of those who remain in hospital are Britons who caught the virus on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan and were flown back to the UK on Saturday. Another 168 Britons have been told to isolate themselves at the H10 Costa Adeje Palace in Tenerife.Of the 13 people in the UK who had previously tested positive for Covid-19, eight have been discharged from hospital. Four of those who remain in hospital are Britons who caught the virus on the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan and were flown back to the UK on Saturday. Another 168 Britons have been told to isolate themselves at the H10 Costa Adeje Palace in Tenerife.
One of the cases, who caught the virus while in Tenerife, is believed to be a parent from Burbage primary school in Buxton, Derbyshire, which says it has had a confirmed case. One of the cases, who caught the virus in Tenerife, is believed to be a parent from Burbage primary school in Buxton, Derbyshire, which says it has had a confirmed case. Parents were told the 350-pupil school would be closed on Thursday due to a “confirmed case of coronavirus amongst our parent population”.
Parents were told the 350-pupil school would be closed on Thursday due to a “confirmed case of coronavirus amongst our parent population”. The message said the closure was a “precautionary measure and to enable a deep clean to be completed”. Buxton Medical Practice also shut its doors, saying it had a confirmed case.
The message, said the closure was a “precautionary measure and to enable a deep clean to be completed”. Responding to the new cases, Prof Rowland Kao, professor of veterinary epidemiology and data science at the University of Edinburgh, said: “We already have evidence of onward transmission occurring outside China and so these two cases [associated with situations with high levels of infection] are not surprising.
Buxton Medical Practice also shut its doors, saying it had a confirmed case. “This occurrence should therefore already be well within the scope of the current approach to control. It does highlight that we should continue to expect more cases without direct association with China, and therefore [despite evidence of the epidemic tailing off in China] a need for continued vigilance with appropriate control measures for some time.”
The new cases come after the health secretary, Matt Hancock, warned MPs on Wednesday to expect more cases and Public Health England (PHE) announced that it was stepping up testing to ascertain “whether there’s evidence of infection more widespread than we think there is”. More than 7,000 people in the UK have been tested to date. PHE said it will expand testing to people with “severe respiratory symptoms”.
Responding to the new cases Prof Rowland Kao, professor of veterinary epidemiology and data science, University of Edinburgh, said: “We already have evidence of onward transmission occurring outside of China and so these two cases (associated with situations with high levels of infection) are not surprising.
“This occurrence should therefore already be well within the scope of the current approach to control. It does highlight that we should continue to expect more cases without direct association with China, and therefore (despite evidence of the epidemic tailing off in China) a need for continued vigilance with appropriate control measures for some time.”
Hancock told parliament on Wednesday that the government was prepared for a pandemic but was currently in the “contain phase” and warned against “overreaction” as some 40 schools either closed their doors or sent pupils home, the oil giant Chevron ordered 300 traders and other staff at its office in Canary Wharf to work from home and the FTSE 100 plummeted on fears of the global economic impact.
On Thursday, the Department for Education (DfE) updated its advice to schools after headteachers complained that the messages they were receiving were inconsistent.On Thursday, the Department for Education (DfE) updated its advice to schools after headteachers complained that the messages they were receiving were inconsistent.
The DfE said schools should not send pupils home unless they have had contact with a confirmed case of Covid-19 and that pupils and staff should only be asked to self-isolate if they have travelled to a category 1 specified country or area in the past 14 days. The DfE said schools should not send pupils home unless they have had contact with a confirmed case of Covid-19 and that pupils and staff should be asked to self-isolate only if they have travelled to a category 1 specified country or area in the past 14 days.
Ministers have announced a mass public information giving advice on how to react to suspected cases and guard against infection amid officials’ fears that it could take just 72 hours for an outbreak the size of Italy’s to take hold. Ministers have announced a mass public information campaign giving advice on how to react to suspected cases and guard against infection amid official fears that it could take just 72 hours for an outbreak the size of Italy’s to take hold.
Authorities in Italy have reported that the number of people infected in the country grew to 400 and 12 people have died.
The UK school closures resulted from precautions taken after staff and pupils returned from skiing trips in northern Italy, where a number of towns have been subjected to containment measures.
On Wednesday, the World Health Organization said the number of new coronavirus cases being officially reported outside China had overtaken those reported by Beijing for the first time since the outbreak began.
On Thursday, China reported an increase in infections from 411 to 433 but the number of deaths almost halved from 52 the previous day to 29. As the situation appears to be improving in China, concerns have been raised about the situation outside the country. South Korea announced 334 new cases, mostly in Daegu, on Thursday while Estonia, Denmark, Pakistan, Georgia, Norway, North Macedonia, Greece and Romania are among countries to report their first case of coronavirus in the last day.
Saudi Arabia took the unprecedented step of banning foreign pilgrims from entering the country five months before the annual hajj pilgrimages.