Expert warns spread of Indian variant poses risk in Ireland

Tomas Ryan from the Independent Scientific Advocacy Group (ISAG) which advocates for Zero Covid says flights from Britain must be restricted.

A public health expert says the Indian variant is going to spread more easily in the population even among vaccinated people.

Covid-19 vaccines have been found to offer a high level of protection against the Indian variant in the UK, especially after two doses.

A study by Public Health England says the Pfizer injection is as much as 88% effective - and the AstraZeneca jab 60% against the Indian variant.

Dr Tomas Ryan from the Independent Scientific Advocacy Group (ISAG) which advocates for Zero Covid says there is also an increased risk of re-infection.

Dr Ryan, an associate professor of biochemistry at Trinity College Dublin, says the mutation poses a risk.

He told Newstalk: "Besides the issue of slightly reduced vaccine efficacy, we can also see significantly increased transmission of the Indian variant in the UK, relative to the existing British B117 Kent variant, and this could be a very big problem for us in Ireland.

"Right now we're acting with a certain degree of uncertainty and we need to learn from how we have behaved in the last year of this pandemic."

The number of patients with Covid-19 in Irish hospitals has risen by 6% in the past week.

It has increased to 116, while there are 43 receiving treatment in ICUs.

It comes as 438 new cases of the virus were confirmed here yesterday.

Dr Ryan says flights from Britain must be restricted.

He said: "Today we need to do everything that we can to discourage to prevent, reduce and quarantine all travel from Britain to Ireland, over the next few weeks.

"We must remember that right now. 85% of the Irish population is not fully vaccinated, and 70% of the Irish population have not received any vaccinations."