Is the new Covid strain more deadly?

The new variant of Sars-CoV-2 is, according to government experts, 71 per cent more transmissible than the previous dominant form, increasing the reproductive rate by between 0.39 and 0.93. But is it any more or less deadly than the older version? All Nervtag has revealed is that there have been 4 deaths recorded among 1,000 cases of the new variant. A rough estimate of the infection fatality rate based on those figures would not be out of line with estimates for the virus as a whole — although the advisory group adds there is not yet enough data to draw any conclusions.

If there were a dramatic difference between the death rate between the old and new strains, however, it would presumably start to show up in the regional data given that the variant strain is much more prevalent in London and the South East. Around 60 per cent of new cases in London are now the new variant.