France, Lebanon confirm first cases of new coronavirus variant | Al Jazeera

Health authorities in France and Lebanon have confirmed their first cases of the coronavirus variant that prompted global travel restrictions and strict lockdown measures in the United Kingdom.

The French health ministry said a French man who arrived in France from the British capital, London, on December 19 had tested positive for the new variant on Friday.

He had no symptoms and was isolating in his home in the central city of Tours.

Authorities have carried out contact-tracing for the health professionals taking care of the patient, the ministry said. Any of their contacts that were seen as vulnerable would similarly be isolated, it said.

In addition to this first case, several other positive samples that “may suggest the VOC 202012/01 variant are being sequenced” by the specialist laboratories of the national Pasteur Institute, the statement added.