inline svgs seem to have issues when using JSX syntax, so this is a possible workaround:
const mySvg = `<svg height="100" width="100">
      <circle cx="50" cy="50" r="40" stroke="black" fill="red" />
       Sorry, your browser does not support inline SVG.  
</svg>`
const svgContainer = <div innerHTML={mySvg}></div>;
very helpfully provided by https://github.com/Frikki !