No large-scale spread of B117 coronavirus in Lansingerland: Health Service

The B117 variant of the coronavirus is not spreading in the municipality of Lansingerland on a large scale, municipal health service GGD and Erasmus MC concluded after testing 45 thousand residents of the Zuid-Holland municipality for the strain.

Lansingerland is the first municipality in the Netherlands to undergo large-scale testing. The study was done in this municipality after an outbreak of the B117 coronavirus at a primary school in Berschenhoek.

About 30 people at the school tested positive for this extra contagious strain of the virus, which was first identified int he United Kingdom. But according to GGD Rotterdam-Rijnmond, the outbreak was largely confined to the school. Some 46 people got the B117 coronavirus from that source.

All Lansingerland residents aged 2 and older were called to be tested for the coronavirus. Between 4 thousand and 5 thousand people were tested per day - 2,500 at the XL test center at Rotterdam The Hague Airport, the rest in other test centers in the area. A total of around 63 thousand people live in the municipality. Over 70 percent of them were tested.