By Alex Trelinski • Published: 28 Apr 2020 • 14:58
UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock has blamed half-term holidays taken by families in Spain and Italy for bringing Covid-19 into the UK.
Mr Hancock was interviewed on LBC Radio by Nick Ferrari this morning (April 28) and said that “the best information we have” suggested that Britons returning from holidays in February got the country infected.
It’s the first time that a senior government figure has suggested what the timeline was for the arrival of the coronavirus in the country, but that contradicts the views of some scientists who believe it started to spread earlier.
According to The Sunday Times newspaper, figures obtained from around 2.6 million people who signed up to the King’s College London’s Covid Symptom Tracker app showed the virus may have arrived in Britain back in January.
Professor Tim Spector, a leading epidemiologist from the university, said it is “highly likely the disease was circulating soon after the New Year.”
When Matt Hancock was asked about the January arrival of Covid-19, he said:
“The government is currently attempting to trace the ‘path of the virus’ but warned that there were questions about the reliability of data.
“Well you can’t rule it out,” he responded to the LBC question from Nick Ferrari.
“But also what you need to do to understand that is to get the genetic code from the early cases.
“But the best information we have is that it came to this country in large numbers from Italy and Spain during half term, and that’s when it seeded here.”
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Hundreds of Chinese UK residents were allowed to travel to China to celebrate their Chinese New Year from all over the UK.
Spot on Marian. The virus was circulating in the UK as early as November/December. The UK government will blame everything and everybody instead of acknowledging their own ineptitude.
It is entirely evident that Hancock is seeking to place the blame elsewhere as a diversion from the failings of his office in addressing the UK response to the pandemic.
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