🦠Covid has nowhere left to go to mutate into a deadly variant.
Covid is unlikely to mutate into a much deadlier variant because there “aren’t many places for the virus to go”, the lead scientist behind the Oxford vaccine has said
⏳Dame Sarah Gilbert explains viruses tend to become less virulent over time as they spread through a population becoming more immune.
Although Dame Sarah said some genetic drift was to be expected - Covid-19 would eventually become like other seasonal coronaviruses
“We already live with four different human coronaviruses that we don’t really ever think about very much and eventually Sars-CoV-2 will become one of those" telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/2…
🔎So far, virus variants which looked like they might be more virulent and evade immunity have been out-competed by the delta variant, which is more infectious.
Experts are still concerned about the beta and lambda variants, but neither has managed a strong foothold in the UK
🧑🔬“It’s watch and wait, but delta is top of the list and other variants are not particularly concerning at the moment," said Professor Sharon Peacock, the executive director of the Covid-19 UK Genomics Consortium telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/2…
💉Prof Peacock said that vaccinating as many people around the world was the best way to prevent the emergence of worrying mutations.
“If we don’t vaccinate people and there is uncontrolled transmission and infection, then that is the right training ground for the virus"
🌍"So vaccination of the world is not only the morally right thing to do, but the strategically right thing to do if we are going to protect the world” telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/2…
Follow vaccination progress, cases and deaths from across the UK and worldwide.
🦠From vaccine passports to travel and from face masks to isolating - here's how the Covid rules will change as we enter autumn👇 telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/…
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🇪🇺“Angela Merkel was the queen of Europe,” @JamesCrisp6
“But now, as she prepares to step down after 16 years and to leave the EU and Germany, a prince is standing, waiting in the wings, ready for his turn in the spotlight.
“It is none other than Emmanuel Macron”
@JamesCrisp6 says Merkel’s departure means the balance of power is going to change dramatically.
🇫🇷“This is the moment for Emmanuel Macron, who himself has been a junior partner to Angela Merkel, to reassert French authority in Brussels and to reassert its position”
🔴Officers investigating the killing of Sabina Nessa said she left her home on Astell Road and walked through Cator Park last Friday towards The Depot bar in Pegler Square, Kidbrooke Village, when she was attacked
"Sabina never arrived at the pub and is thought to have been murdered as she walked through the park," the force said.
A post-mortem examination on the 28-year-old, carried out on Monday, was inconclusive
It is believed that Ms Nessa was found under a pile of leaves by a dog walker on Saturday morning, nearly 24 hours after police suspect she was killed.
The Metropolitan Police never received a missing persons report
💡Vladimir Putin has his finger hovering over Europe’s light switch.
Kremlin critics, and now even the International Energy Agency, have accused Russia and state producer Gazprom of restricting supply to Europe, helping to fuel the surge in gas prices telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/…
🇷🇺The Kremlin has added to these suspicions by offering a simple solution to the feared winter shortage:
➡️To approve the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline that will tighten Putin’s grip on European energy supply
The pipeline, which bypasses Ukraine and is vehemently opposed by the US, is finally ready to pump gas into Europe but is awaiting approval from German regulators.
🗣️“Get Nord Stream 2 operational or else: that’s in the end the signal they sent,” says Prof Andreas Goldthau
🪴This year’s unique show, taking place in September instead of in spring for the first time in the show’s 108-year history, presented a challenge to designers.
Happily, they have risen to the occasion with chutzpah, (we are a nation of 30 million gardeners, after all)
🏆The Guangzhou Garden, by Peter Chmiel and Chin-Jung Chen, won best in show.
Designed to promote cleaner water and air, it features a woodland dell, shelter for wildlife and social spaces for people to gather
🔴The British Retail Consortium, which represents the major chains, said it expected to see food shortages by the end of the week
Pork suppliers have warned of "farmageddon" within 10 days.
🐷Pig farmers have threatened to slaughter animals on their land for render because of a growing backlog at abattoirs and processing plants due to the CO2 shortage
📉In a landmark study, scientists from the University of Manchester and the University of Western Australia found that they could reduce the number of children being diagnosed with autism at the age of three, from 20.5% per cent to 6.7%
🔴The intervention involved videoing at-risk babies as they interacted with a parent, before a therapist showed how the child was trying to communicate, so that the parent could respond