Evidence people who test positive for UK coronavirus variant have more risk - UK's Vallance

Reuters
·1 min read
Britain's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance speaks during a virtual news conference in London
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LONDON (Reuters) - There is evidence that people who tested positive for the so called 'UK variant' of COVID-19 have an increased risk, the UK's Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance said on Friday.

"There is evidence that there's an increased risk for those who have the new variant, compared to the old virus," Vallance said at a news briefing, referring to data on those who test positive.

"If you took ... a man in their sixties, the average risk is that for 1,000 people who got infected, roughly 10 would be expected to unfortunately die with the virus. With the new variant, for 1,000 people infected roughly 13 or 14 people might be expected to die," he added.

(Reporting by William James, writing by James Davey; editing by Alistair Smout)