After the discovery of a first case of the British variant of the coronavirus in Marseille, investigations revealed 23 people positive for Covid-19, including 7 carriers of the British variant. This was announced by Michèle Rubirola, first deputy mayor of Marseille, this Sunday, January 10 at a press conference.
A family cluster identified in Marseille
On December 31, an alert was given in Marseille following the identification of a case infected with the British variant of Sars-CoV-2. This is a patient from a French family of 5 living in the United Kingdom and having stayed in Marseille for the end of the year celebrations. A tracing of contact cases was carried out and made it possible to identify 45 contact cases.
Of these 45 people, 23 have tested positive for Covid-19, as the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur Regional Health Agency declared in a press release published on Saturday, January 9. Investigations are continuing to find other possible contact cases. The discovery of this Marseille cluster is one of the reasons that prompted the prefect of Bouches-du-Rhône to advance the curfew to 6 p.m. in the department.
7 contact cases found to be positive for the British variant
Initially, only patient zero was diagnosed as a carrier of the British variant. Subsequently, analyzes on the samples taken from the 23 other people who tested positive for the coronavirus were carried out in the laboratory of the Institut hospitalo-universitaire (IHU) Méditerranée Infection. Results: among the 23 people with Covid-19, seven are carriers of the British variant as announced by Michèle Rubirola, first deputy mayor of Marseille, this Sunday, January 10 during a press conference.
“Every minute counts to stem the spread”
Benoît Payan, Mayor of Marseille declared: “ Now every minute counts to stem the spread of the English strain. We must react immediately, we want us to get out of the usual patterns of the crisis and do everything to urgently trace, test and isolate all potential carriers of the British strain. “.
He therefore called on the government to step up checks at airports. ” At the same time, we are ready to carry out a major vaccination campaign, as soon as the government provides us with the vaccines. Until then, we call on all Marseillaises and ders Marseillais to respect barrier gestures and health instructions ” did he declare. In the meantime, marine firefighters are mobilized to carry out tests while others take samples in wastewater and surface samples to identify the presence of the virus.
