The UK has reported a further 178,250 Covid cases in the past 24-hour period as four more hospital trusts declared critical incidents.
The number is down slightly from the 179,756 new cases reported on Thursday.
Another 229 people have also died in the UK within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19.
At the same time, the number of NHS staff off work due to Covid has risen by 59 per cent in a week, new data shows.
NHS England data revealed 39,142 NHS staff at hospital trusts in England were absent for Covid-related reasons on 2 January, up 59 per cent on the previous week (24,632) and more than three times the number at the start of December (12,508).
The figures suggest one in 25 (4 per cent) of NHS staff working in acute hospital trusts are off sick or self-isolating due to the coronavirus.
Emergency services continue to suffer the impact of Covid staff shortages, with Northamptonshire declaring a system-wide major incident.
Northamptonshire Local Resilience Forum, which is made up of NHS organisations, local authorities, Northamptonshire Fire and Rescue Service and Northamptonshire Police, issued the alert due to “rising demand on services and staffing levels.”
Around 200 armed forces personnel were deployed in London hospitals on Friday to respond to growing staff shortages while around 150 staff will support the North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) from next week.
NHS national medical director Professor Stephen Powis said rising Covid cases were “piling even more pressure” on hospital trust workers.
He said: “Omicron means more patients to treat and fewer staff to treat them.
“In fact, around 10,000 more colleagues across the NHS were absent each day last week compared with the previous seven days and almost half of all absences are now down to Covid.”
Patricia Marquis, the Royal College of Nursing’s director for England, said: “Outside of healthcare, staffing shortages are closing shops and cancelling trains but nurses can’t stop helping their patients.
“Instead, they find themselves spread thinner and thinner, but they can’t keep spinning plates indefinitely either - this situation is simply not safe.”
