COVID-19: Only a "handful" of Indian variant in Wiltshire
We are being asked to continue with good hand hygiene and social distancing
Wiltshire's Public Health Director has confirmed there has only been a "small handful" of cases of the Indian variant of Covid-19 in the county.
Kate Blackburn says they have been responded to using enhanced test and trace methods, which has been "effective"**** in containing any further spread.
There is at least one case currently in the county, but it is fully contained.
More than 2,300 have been confirmed across the UK, and there is some concern from ministers and health officials as it's believed to be more easily passed from person to person than previous types of the virus.
Kate Blackburn says they're many things we can be doing to reduce the spread of the variant:
"Here in Wiltshire we have had a very small handful of cases confirmed as the Indian variant, I'm not going to go into specific details of those but they have been responded to using enhanced test and trace methods and working closely with our partners and that's been effective in containing any possible further spread. What I would say is I would really urge everyone to continue to engage with test and trace at all levels, it's really important part of containing the infection so if you're being contacted by test and trace please engage fully that's really important.
It's fairly inevitable that case numbers will increase as more and more of society opens up again and the Chief Medical Officer said on Friday that he believes the Indian variant will be the most dominant variant of Covid-19 in this country but I think the important thing is that no matter what the variant is we need people to continue with the basic behaviours that have been in place for well over a year which are the most effective in terms of infection prevention and control so washing hands for 20 seconds with soap and water regularly and sanitising them, wearing a face mask where required, socially distancing as much as possible and if you've got any of those covid symptoms booking a test and self-isolating immediately."
LATEST CASES
In the seven days to 12th May, there have been 74 positive cases in Wiltshire.
That's an increase of 6 on the previous week.
This means the county's rolling rate per 100,000 population is at 14.8.
The national average is 23.