Southport residents urged to ‘stay at home’ by Matt Hancock after discovery of South African Covid variant

Door-to-door Covid testing will be carried out across homes in the PR9 area of Southport, Matt Hancock said tonight. 

The ‘surge testing’ is designed to stop the spread of the South African Covid variant, which has been spotted in Southport. 

The northern part of Southport is one of eight areas around the UK where the South African strain has been detected. 

Speaking at tonight’s Downing Street press conference, Health & Social Care Secretary Matt Hancock said: “Our global leadership in genomic sequencing has helped us to spot new variants here in the UK, and quickly alert the rest of the world. But there are other countries that don’t have the capacity they need.

“Last week, we offered our capacity and expertise to other nations through our New Variant Assessment Platform, because a mutation in one part of the world is a threat to people everywhere.

“For example, our South African colleagues spotted a new variant through their high quality genomic sequencing and rightly notified the world, as we did with the variant that we discovered here in the UK.

“We’ve now identified 105 cases of this variant here. Eleven of those cases don’t appear to have any links to international travel.

“There’s currently no evidence to suggest this variant is any more severe, but we need to come down on it hard and we will. We’ve already made sure that all these cases are isolating and that we’ve done enhanced contact tracing of all of their close contacts.

“We are surging extra testing into the areas where this variant has been found and sequencing every single positive case.

“Working with local authorities, we are going door-to-door to test people in the local area. These cases have been identified in the following postcodes:

• W7, N17, CR4, WS2, ME15, EN10, GU21, and PR9

“If you live in one of these postcodes where we’re sending in enhanced testing, then it’s imperative that you stay at home. And that you get a test, even if you don’t have symptoms.

“This is so important so that we can break the chains of transmission of this new variant. And we’ve got to bring this virus to heel.”

There was good news at the conference today, with the Covid vaccine rollout continuing at speed. 

Matt Hancock said: “I’m so proud of the team, who’ve now vaccinated 9.2 million people across the UK, that includes 931,204 vaccinations just this weekend.

“And to put that into context – that’s one in every 60 adults in the whole United Kingdom vaccinated in one single weekend. It’s a mammoth effort.

“I know how much these jabs mean to people. And I’m so grateful for all the messages that we get, and all the pictures that I’m sent of people being vaccinated.

“It fills me with pride that so many people are doing so much to help for this roll out to happen so smoothly and I want to say thanks to you all.

“We’ve now vaccinated almost 9 in 10 of all over 80s in the UK and now, as of today, we’ve vaccinated over half of all people in their 70s.”

The UK has today ordered another 40 million vaccine doses from Valneva, which will be manufactured in the UK.

Matt Hancock said: “So there’s lots of good news, but this is a stark reminder that the fight against this virus isn’t over yet.

“Every day, we’re protecting more people and getting ourselves one step closer to normal life. “But this is no time to let things slip. So let’s, all of us, do what we must to get this virus under control.” 

Do you have any stories for Stand Up For Southport? Please message Andrew Brown via Facebook here or email me at: mediaandrewbrown@gmail.com