EU gravely concerned over Covid-19 variants - RTE

EU leaders have expressed grave concern over the emergence of new variants of the coronavirus and their potential impact on the pandemic in Europe.

Following a video conference of all 27 leaders, member states have agreed to intensify antigen testing and genomic sequencing in order to get a deeper understanding of the new variants and their prevalence across the European Union.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the situation was very serious, although an acceleration of vaccine roll outs in the next number of weeks offered hope.

The concern is that the variants first detected in England, Brazil and South Africa are so transmissible that they will require much tougher lockdowns.

Calls then for border closures, travel bans and other harsh measures could mean a further hit to the European economy...