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// On 24 January, the health secretary, Matt Hancock, announced 77 cases of the South African variant had been detected in the UK, and that these were linked to people entering the country from overseas.
But Public Health England (PHE) has said that cases are no longer confined to people who have recently entered the country, with 11 cases picked up among those with no such travel history – in other words the variant is spreading between people in the community.
To date the South African variant has been found in more than 30 other countries, including Austria, Belgium, Kenya, the United Arab Emirates and Japan. In some of those countries, including Belgium, cases of community transmission have been detected. //
We knew it was in Europe, but we allowed flights from there. Just stopping flights from South Africa was like closing the front door, but leaving all the windows wide open.