The number of provinces where the new variants of the coronavirus were reported has risen to 23, a member of the Health Ministry’s Coronavirus Scientific Advisory Board warned.
Her remarks on Thursday, one day after Health Minister Fahrettin Koca announced 196 cases stemming from multiple variants, raised concerns in the country embattled with the outbreak. Last week, the number of provinces with the new variant was announced as 17.
Professor Sema Turan said that the reports from the United Kingdom where the first new variant was seen, show that the severity of cases with the new mutation was also high. “We have to be careful. Otherwise, there will be a need for more hospital beds and intensive care unit capacity,” she told Demirören News Agency (DHA) on Thursday.
Koca had announced after a meeting of the board on Wednesday that two people have contracted the South African variant of the coronavirus while one has tested positive for the Brazil variant. He also said that Turkey has 196 confirmed cases of the U.K. virus strain so far. In the wake of rising cases once again, the measures against the pandemic will continue full throttle, he said.
The country closely monitors the variant cases and had suspended several flights as a precaution for arrivals from other countries with the potential of infection. “The virus needs mutation for survival. In each type of viral infection, the virus changes its structure in a way. This is their method of protecting themselves. It sometimes happens with changes in a single protein,” Turan said.
