European Union experts believe existing vaccines are effective against the new fast-spreading strain identified in Britain, Germany's health minister said yesterday.

"According to everything we know so far" the new strain "has no impact on the vaccines", which remain "just as effective", Jens Spahn told public broadcaster ZDF, citing "talks among experts of European authorities".

Spahn was referring especially to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which is already being administered in countries including the US and UK and which is on the brink of receiving approval from the European Medicines Agency.

A health ministry spokesman said the EU experts' meeting had taken place on Sunday and included representatives of Berlin's Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for public health.

A number of EU nations have banned air travel from Britain in response to the new strain, while France said it would block people arriving from the UK and all freight unless it is unaccompanied.

Within Britain, London has announced tougher infection control measures affecting some parts of the country.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Saturday the variant could be up to 70 percent more infectious than the main strain, based on preliminary data.

The World Health Organization said that nine cases have been detected in Denmark and one each in the Netherlands and Australia, while Italy said late Sunday it too had detected a single case in a person returning from Britain.

Germany, which holds the EU's rotating presidency, has organised a meeting of experts to discuss the bloc's response to the new threat, the health ministry spokesman said.

The meeting will be held under the European Council's IPCR crisis response scheme, which can be invoked for health, environmental or terrorist emergencies among others.

Meanwhile, The EU's drug regulator will decide on Monday whether to authorise the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine, with desperate countries hoping for the green light to finally start inoculating their citizens.

The Amsterdam-based European Medicines Agency dramatically moved the decision on the jab ahead from December 29, following pressure to accelerate the process from Germany and other EU states.

The clamour for action grew as Britain and the United States have already started giving their citizens the vaccine developed by US giant Pfizer and German firm BioNTech under emergency national rules.

The EU will start Covid-19 inoculations on December 27 providing the EMA grants a one-year conditional marketing authorisation, the European Commission has said.