NEW DELHI, Dec 29: Six travellers who returned from the UK have tested positive for the new mutant coronavirus strain, the Health Ministry said. The results came on Tuesday morning.

Of the six, three are from Bengaluru, two from Hyderabad and one from Pune. "Samples of 3 UK returnees have been tested & found positive for new UK strain in NIMHANS, Bengaluru, two in Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad & one in National Institute of Virology, Pune. All 6 people have been kept in single room isolation," the Union Health Ministry said.

The Ministry said between November 25 and December 23 about 33,000 passengers came to various Indian airports from the UK. "All these passengers are being tracked and subjected by states/UTs to RT-PCR tests. So far only 114 have been found positive for COVID-19," it said.

"The situation is under careful watch and regular advice is being provided to the States for enhanced surveillance, containment, testing & dispatch of samples to Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG) labs. It is important to note that the presence of the new UK Variant has already been reported by Denmark, Netherlands, Australia, Italy, Sweden, France, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, Canada, Japan, Lebanon and Singapore, so far," a Central Government release stated.

With a view to checking transmission of the new virus strain from the UK, most countries, including India, had banned flights from that country as soon it was confirmed about ten days ago that the new variant is spreading fast there.

Compared with the covid pathogen, the new mutant spreads 70% faster and was the cause of 60 % of deaths in the UK during December. However, it has not been confirmed whether the new strain is more lethal or not.

It is also not known if the covid vaccines being administered in several countries or being developed will be effective against the new coronavirus variant.

Although, the BioNTech which developed the covid vaccine in partnership with Pfizer claims that with the new technology they are using it could be possible to develop a new vaccine in a couple of weeks if the vaccine currently being administered turns out to be less effective.

Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has asked the countrymen to restrain New Year celebrations and avoid gatherings so as to control the spread of the virus.