Kent variant of coronavirus is most dominant strain in Wales

A variant of coronavirus, which was first found in Kent and is known as B117, is believed to be up to 70 per cent transmissible than the previous strain that was dominant in the UK.

In a press conference earlier today health minister, Vaughan Gething, said: "We have to be careful how we come out of lockdown.

"The highly infectious Kent strain is now the most dominant strain in Wales.

"Slightly mutated versions of the Kent strain have also been detected just over our border in Bristol and Liverpool."

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Public Health Wales has also confirmed that this Kent variant is currently the most prevalent in Wales.

Incident director at Public Health Wales, Dr Giri Shankar, said: "Our latest analyses of Covid-19 test results estimate that between 50 and 95 per cent of recent cases in parts of Wales have been determined to have the proxy marker consistent with the Kent variant."

There are now four “variants of concern” of the virus that causes Covid-19 identified by government advisers, three of these have been found in the UK, and the fourth is the Brazil variant identified in people who had travelled to Japan.