HAMPSHIRE County Council has reassured residents after a case of the Indian variant of Covid-19 was found at a primary school in Winchester.

St Bede, in Gordon Road, was notified by Public Health England of a single positive case of the variant at the school.

Those who had been in close contact with the person who tested positive were asked to self-isolate and were offered testing.

Now, the county council, who is charge of public health for Hampshire, has tried to reassure people about the variant and the case in Winchester.

Read next: 

Simon Bryant, Director of Public Health at Hampshire County Council: “We were recently made aware of a single case of the Indian variant of Covid-19 at St Bede primary school in Winchester. As with all cases of the virus in a school setting, Public Health England’s Local Health Protection Team has been working closely with the school to provide practical advice and guidance, including offering testing to close contacts of the case.

“We regularly remind our schools to closely follow the national guidance to keep their school communities safe and to help prevent the spread of infection. St Bede has taken robust measures to protect pupils and staff and is continuing to do so. This includes ensuring staff and pupils follow self-isolation guidance where required, maintaining class bubbles, ongoing promotion of twice weekly testing, as well as good hand hygiene at all times.”

“I understand that people may be concerned about variants of the virus, and the Indian variant has received a lot of publicity recently, but it’s important to emphasise that there is currently no evidence that this causes more serious illness or is resistant to the vaccine. It’s important that we all keep following the ‘hands-face-space-and let in fresh air’ rules to protect ourselves against all variants of Covid-19 – doing this will help ensure we can continue enjoying our new freedoms throughout the summer and beyond.”