South Africa today said it should be 'applauded not punished' for detecting the super mutant Omicron Covid variant. 

The strain makes vaccines at least 40 per cent less effective against transmission than they are against Delta, according to experts, but scientists believe jabs still prevent it causing severe disease and hospitalisations. 

Britain, the US and EU all banned flights from southern Africa coming into their countries yesterday after the discovery of the strain, which originated in the region.

But the South African foreign affairs ministry said the decision 'is akin to punishing South Africa for its advanced genomic sequencing and the ability to detect new variants quicker'. 

It said: 'Excellent science should be applauded and not punished.'

The ministry pointed out that new variants had been discovered in other parts of the world.

'Each of those cases have had no recent links with Southern Africa, but the reaction to those countries is starkly different to cases in Southern Africa,' it said.

South Africa recorded 2,828 new Covid cases yesterday, more than double the 1,374 recorded last Thursday, but infection levels have yet to skyrocket in the country and no hospitalisations with the new variant have occurred so far.