The UK health officials announced on 18.12.2020, that it has identified a new  and deadlier variant of COVID-19 unique to the United Kingdom which can spread more quickly than other coronavirus strains.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has declared severe coronavirus restrictions on 18 million people in London and across southeast England, in order to contain the spread of the new strain try to prevent the new virus strain from spreading across the country. The British Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the BBC on Sunday that “the new variant is out of control”.

The World Health Organisation also released a statement saying it will reveal further details of the new variant as and when the data becomes available from the to control the spread of Covid-19UK. Earlier Maria Van Kerkhove, the Covid-19 technical lead for the WHO, said that countries need to take adequate measures to control the spread of Covid-19, especially to prevent further opportunities to for the virus to mutate in light of the discoveries of new variants of the disease in Denmark, the United Kingdom, and South Africa.

The WHO officials also said there is no evidence to suggest the impact of the newly discovered strains of the disease on the safety or efficacy of vaccines against Covid-19. Following this on Sunday, European countries like Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, France and Germany including Canada which is beyond the European continent, announced bans on travel from UK to avoid the spread of the new and more contagious strain of Covid-19.

Given the large population of India and the strain on health and physical infrastructure being already under severe stress to contain and heal patients suffering from the disease, should not India also follow suit to ban travel to and from the UK to safeguard India from being affected by the newer and deadlier variety of the virus. As once the newer and more deadly strain of the virus affects us, we might be forced to get into a complete lockdown mode which would set the already fragile economy down the precipice. Given our past experience that the pandemic came into our nation mainly due to travelers from abroad, the UK in particular apart from the huge Islamic Markaz meet in Delhi, which proved to be a super spreader of the virus all across India, the powers that be at the Centre should now at a war footing take steps to ban travel from UK as each flight from the UK could be inviting in the deadlier variety of Covid-19 which is said to be very contagious and severe.

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