Health Times
UK health secretary Matt Hancock has announced the United Kingdom’s support with genomics expertise to help other countries identify new COVID-19 variants comes as researchers at the Quadram Institute outline their work supporting scientists in Zimbabwe.
On Tuesday the UK government announcement of the New Variant Assessment Platform will see other countries offered UK laboratory capacity and advice to analyse new strains of coronavirus.
In common with many other countries facing the start of the coronavirus pandemic, Zimbabwe recorded its first recorded case of the SARS-CoV-2 in March 2020. Extensive public health interventions were swiftly put in place to help control transmission and protect people.
UK launches global assessment platform to track new coronavirus variants as they emerge The platform will supposedly offer genomics expertise in the UK to identify new variants, to countries who do not have the resources to do so. The novel coronavirus was declared a pandemic of international concern by the WHO in April.
The UK launched a New Variant Assessment Platform on Tuesday, which it says will offer the country s world-leading genomics expertise to identify new variants of the virus that causes COVID-19 to countries who do not have the resources to do so. As part of the UK s Presidency of the G7 this year, UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock outlined the plans in a speech at the think tank Chatham House the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London as he laid out his vision for a stronger, more collaborative and effective global health system, not just in fighting the COVID-19
27 January 2021
Mr Speaker, with permission, I will make a statement on the Government’s measures to safeguard our United Kingdom against the new variants of Covid until we have administered enough vaccinations to free ourselves from the virus.
And I am acutely conscious that at this moment, parents are balancing the demands of working from home with supporting the education of their children, businesspeople are enduring the sight of their shops or restaurants or other enterprises standing empty and idle and, sadly, too many are coping with the anxiety of illness or tragedy of bereavement.
I am deeply sorry to say that the number of people that have taken from us has surpassed 100,000, as the house was discussing only an hour or so ago, and I know the House will join me in offering condolences to all those who have lost loved ones.
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