Potential 'coronavirus' incident causes closure of Northamptonshire surgery

The Washington House site surgery of the Brackley Medical Centre has been temporarily shut down to be cleared and cleaned.

A message on the surgery's Facebook site this morning said: "Due to a potential corona virus incident, we have had to close the Washington House site until the premises is cleaned and cleared as a precautionary measure. We will update as soon as we can."

No more detail is known at the moment but the Banbury Guardian will bring more detail when it is available.

A BBC report today says four new cases of the virus have been confirmed in the country, bringing the total to eight.

It comes as the Government announced new powers to keep people in quarantine to stop spread of the virus.

To do this the Department of Health has described the virus as a 'serious and imminent' thread to public health, the BBC reports.

The overall risk level to the UK remains "moderate".

There have been more than 40,000 cases of the virus around the world, most in China where the death toll has passed 900., mostly in China. However reports say the number of newly-infected people per day has stabilised.