A case of coronavirus has been diagnosed in London for the first time, multiple reports have suggested, as health authorities confirmed a ninth person in the UK has tested positive for the virus.
The latest patient to catch the Covid-19 virus was infected while in China, professor Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer for England, has said.
They are now being treated at a specialist centre at Guy’s and St Thomas’ in the capital.
In a statement, Whitty said: “One further patient in England has tested positive for novel coronavirus, bringing the total number of cases in the UK to nine.
“This virus was passed on in China and the patient has now been transferred to a specialist NHS centre at Guy’s and St Thomas’ in London.”
Eight others in England have already been diagnosed with the virus, which emerged in Wuhan, China.
The ninth diagnosis in the UK came hours after Dr Paul Cosford, from Public Health England, told the BBC more cases of coronavirus in the UK are “highly likely”.
He said there are a number of “countries of concern” and that people returning from travelling abroad could bring in further cases.
Of the nine people so far diagnosed with coronavirus in the UK, two are GPs.
Officials know that the pair worked at a nursing home, Worthing Hospital A&E and two GP practices between them.
Public Health England (PHE) confirmed on Wednesday it has traced and advised all close contacts of the two GPs, including about 12 patients.
Meanwhile, the quarantine of 83 people being held in Arrowe Park Hospital in Merseyside is expected to be lifted on Thursday.
All of those in quarantine were flown back from China and taken directly to the hospital after arriving in the UK on January 31.
News that they will be released from quarantine comes amid reports they have all tested negative for the covid-19 strain of the coronavirus.
A spokesman for the Department of Health said the “quarantine is expected to end tomorrow” but declined to comment on the test results of the patients.
Elsewhere, Steve Walsh, the businessman at the centre of the UK outbreak of coronavirus, has said he is “happy to be home” after being given the all-clear and then discharged from hospital.
Walsh, a 53-year-old scout leader from Hove in East Sussex, contracted coronavirus on a business trip to Singapore – and is linked to five other people diagnosed with it in the UK.
On his way back to the UK from Singapore, he stopped off at a ski region in France, where five other Britons were subsequently infected with coronavirus, now also known as Covid-19.
Walsh is also linked to a Briton taken ill in Majorca, taking the number of confirmed cases linked to him to 11.
In a statement on his release from hospital, Walsh said: “I want to give a big thank you to the NHS who have been great throughout and my thoughts are with everyone around the world who continues to be affected by the virus.”