This blog is closing now but you can continue to keep up wuth developments at the new blog that I’ve just started up here.
Mexico’s health ministry reported 289 more deaths from Covid-19 on Tuesday evening local time, bringing the country’s death toll since the pandemic began to 295,601.
New Omicron variant 'identified in Australian case'
A new Omicron variant, known as Omicron “like”, has been identified in an overseas arrival to Queensland from South Africa, Australian Associated Press reports.
Confirmation of the new lineage came as health authorities identified another case of Omicron in an overseas arrival from Nigeria, health minister Yvette D’Ath said on Wednesday
“I want to give a huge thank you to our forensic (and) scientific services, because it is their work ... with the international committee that has led to the ... reclassifying of Omicron into two lineages, and we have both of them here in Queensland,” D’Ath said.
The case from Nigeria is currently in hotel quarantine in Cairns and everyone on the direct flight from Sydney has been deemed a close contact.
Confirmation of Omicron in Queensland come as the state reports two new cases in quarantine on Wednesday, one from interstate and one from overseas.
Hello - this is Martin Farrer taking over from Léonie Chao-Fong on the blog.
We’ve got some more detail from South Korea about its increasingly serious outbreak. Prime minister Kim Boo-kyum said on Wednesday morning that daily cases topped 7,000 for the first time on Tuesday, putting hospital capacity under strain as deaths and severe cases rise.
The government will mobilise additional personnel to oversee coronavirus patients treating themselves at home and improve the emergency transfer system to hospitals for those who develop severe symptoms under the at-home treatment, Kim told a Covid-19 response meeting.
Private clinics will also treat COVID-19 patients in addition to large hospitals.
With 80% of the country’s cases in the greater Seoul area, authorities have struggled to secure enough beds for hospitalised patients.
South Korea imposed stricter measures on Monday, including reduced numbers of people allowed at private gatherings and expanding vaccine pass mandates to contain growing coronavirus infections and the Omicron variant.
South Korea has so far confirmed 36 cases of the Omicron variant.
Summary
That’s it from me, Léonie Chao-Fong, for today. Before I hand over to my colleague, here is a quick roundup of what’s been happening so far:
- Boris Johnson is facing accusations of lying after senior No 10 officials were filmed joking about a staff Christmas party that would have contravened strict Covid regulations in place at the time. Johnson and his aides have repeatedly denied that the event broke Covid rules or took place at all. The Metropolitan Police has confirmed it is reviewing the video footage.
- Separately, the UK’s education department confirmed a report that some staff and the then education secretary Gavin Williamson held an office party last year, while London was in tier 2, the second-highest level of Covid restrictions.
- Early data from South Africa suggests the Omicron variant can partially evade protection from the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine. Researchers found there was about a fortyfold reduction in vaccine-induced antibodies that could neutralise the Omicron variant relative to an earlier strain.
- The African Union has called for an urgent end to travel restrictions imposed on some of its member states, arguing that the measures effectively penalise governments for timely data sharing in line with international health regulations.
- Scientists have identified a “stealth” version of the Omicron variant which cannot be detected with the routine tests that public health officials are using to track its spread around the world. The stealth variant has many mutations in common with standard Omicron, but researchers say it is genetically distinct and so may well behave differently.
- Daily cases in South Korea have surpassed 7,000 for the first time since the start of the pandemic, the country’s prime minister Kim Boo-kyum said.
- No more than 10 visitors will be allowed in private homes in Norway, and people must keep a distance of at least one metre from anyone outside of their household in new restrictions introduced by the government today. Prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre warned people to expect a “different Christmas holiday” following a recent surge of infections and hospitalisations.
- From Wednesday, people in Sweden will face new measures to curb rising Covid infections, including renewed social distancing, home-working and the use of face masks on public transport. “We need to work together so that the situation doesn’t get worse, so today we are presenting further precautionary measures,” the prime minister, Magdalena Andersson said.
- Nicola Sturgeon urged companies in Scotland to ensure that all staff who can are working from home until the middle of January, telling people to do a lateral flow test “on every occasion” they intend to mix with others over the festive season, whether at work, socialising or going shopping.
- Preliminary evidence indicates that the Omicron variant likely has a higher degree of transmissibility but causes less severe illness, US infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci said, warning it will take a few weeks to reach any definitive conclusions.
- EU health agencies have recommended that Covid vaccines be mixed and matched for both initial courses and booster doses. Evidence suggests that the combination of viral vector vaccines and mRNA vaccines produces good levels of antibodies against the coronavirus, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said in a joint statement.
Daily cases in South Korea have surpassed 7,000 for the first time since the start of the pandemic, the country’s prime minister Kim Boo-kyum said.
The Yonhap news agency quotes the PM at a government Covid-19 response meeting:
In the capital area, where 80% of total cases are reported, we continue to add hospital beds with active cooperation from the medical community, but still it is tough to catch up with the pace of rising virus cases.
Updated
Pfizer vaccine may be less effective against Omicron, early data finds
The Omicron variant can partially evade protection from the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine, according to early data from South Africa.
Prof Alex Sigal, a professor at the Africa Health Research Institute, said there was “a very large drop” in neutralisation of the Omicron variant relative to an earlier strain.
The lab tested blood from 12 people who had been vaccinated with the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine but had not received a booster shot.
Researchers found there was about a fortyfold reduction in vaccine-induced antibodies that could neutralise the Omicron variant.
The preliminary data in the manuscript has not yet been peer-reviewed.
The UK Department for Education has admitted it held a social gathering of staff last December in contravention to Covid social distancing rules.
It comes after a report claimed that then education secretary Gavin Williamson threw a party where he delivered a short speech before officials and ministers knocked back glasses of wine.
Up to two dozen of Williamson’s staff gathered for “drinks and canapes” in the DfE cafe on 10 December, the Mirror reports. At the time, London was in tier 2, which banned any social mixing between households.
One source told the paper:
There were lots of people gathered in the cafe area, mingling and drinking wine. It was just so reckless.
While another said:
He hosted a drinks do when people were considering whether they could spend Christmas with their families.
In response, a DfE spokesperson said:
On December 10 2020 a gathering of colleagues who were already present at the office - and who had worked together throughout the pandemic, as they couldn’t work from home - took place in the DfE office building in London at a time when the city was subject to tier 2 restrictions.
The gathering was used to thank those staff for their efforts during the pandemic.
Drinks and snacks were brought by those attending and no outside guests or supporting staff were invited or present.
While this was work-related, looking back we accept it would have been better not to have gathered in this way at that particular time.
Just a week before the party, Williamson urged people to take the “responsible approach” of following social distancing and self-isolation rules.
Updated
The Metropolitan Police has confirmed it is reviewing video footage of senior UK No 10 officials discussing a Christmas party.
A statement from the force said:
We are aware of footage obtained by ITV News relating to alleged breaches of the Health Protection Regulations at a Government building in December 2020.
It is our policy not to routinely investigate retrospective breaches of the Covid-19 regulations, however the footage will form part of our considerations.
Preliminary and anecdotal evidence indicates that the Omicron variant likely has a higher degree of transmissibility but causes less severe illness, according to US infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci.
Speaking during a White House coronavirus task force briefing today, he said:
It appears that with the cases that are seen, we are not seeing a very severe profile of disease.
In fact, it might be — and I underscore might be — less severe as shown by the ratio of hospitalisations per number of new cases.
More data is expected next week, Fauci said, but it will take a few weeks to reach any definitive conclusions.
The UK’s scientific and medical community have been responding to the leaked video showing senior Downing Street staff joking about holding a Christmas party just days after the event is alleged to have taken place last December.
Trisha Greenhalgh, professor of primary care health sciences at the University of Oxford, slammed Boris Johnson’s then press secretary Allegra Stratton for laughing in the footage.
Dear Allegra Stratton
— Trisha Greenhalgh (@trishgreenhalgh) December 7, 2021
On the day you partied, my mother called me, breathless and feverish. I didn’t visit. On the day you joked, she was admitted to hospital. I didn’t visit. As you celebrated Christmas, she died without family by her side. I promise you, it wasn’t funny. https://t.co/a8g9Slncej
Prof Christina Pagel, a member of the Independent Sage committee, said the video was “damning” and revealed the government’s hypocrisy while people were making enormous sacrifices.
this is very damning... and tbh having a good laugh about their party while London & SE were in lockdown, people were making huge sacrifices, the NHS was straining and alpha was allowed to spread everywhere else is pretty fucking shit. https://t.co/58YDAJ2cHL
— Prof. Christina Pagel (@chrischirp) December 7, 2021
Loughborough University data analyst Dr Duncan Robertson said the leaked video could impact how the public heed public health measures and restrictions.
This sort of thing makes it trickier to control Omicron. That potentially has consequences. https://t.co/rUupid3NXO
— Dr Duncan Robertson (@Dr_D_Robertson) December 7, 2021
The African Union has called for an urgent end to travel restrictions imposed on some of its member states.
In a statement, the AU said the measures effectively penalise governments for timely data sharing in line with international health regulations, and could act “as a disincentive for information sharing in the future, potentially posing a threat to health security on the continent and globally”.
Updated
Northern Ireland confirms first Omicron cases
Three Omicron cases have been confirmed in total, the Department of Health said. Two are from the same household in the greater Belfast area and a third unconnected case is in the South Eastern Trust area.
All three positive cases have a link to travel from Great Britain to Northern Ireland, the department said, adding there is no current indication of wider community transmission present.
The UK Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer, called on Boris Johnson to “come clean and apologise” after TV footage emerged showing senior No 10 officials joking on camera about a Christmas party in lockdown last December.
In the video obtained by ITV, an adviser to the PM is seen joking with Allegra Stratton, Johnson’s then press secretary, about “a Downing Street Christmas party on Friday night”.
The footage was shot on 22 December 2020, just four days after the date on which multiple sources have said there was a staff party inside Downing Street, which would have contravened strict Covid regulations in place at the time.
Johnson’s spokesperson and several ministers have insisted that any event complied with Covid rules, without saying why, before the spokesperson changed stance on Monday, saying no party had taken place.
On Tuesday, Johnson’s spokesperson had reiterated that this was Downing Street’s view, saying: “I don’t think there is anything to add to what I have said previously. Our position has not changed.”
But the video – recorded as part of preparations for planned daily televised briefings hosted by Stratton, which were later abandoned – will raise fresh questions about No 10’s version of events and increase pressure for a formal inquiry.
Starmer said that during the lockdown last December people followed rules “even when that meant being separated from their families, locked down and – tragically for many – unable to say goodbye to their loved ones”, adding:
They had a right to expect that the government was doing the same. To lie and to laugh about those lies is shameful. The prime minister now needs to come clean, and apologise.
Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, described the video as “damning”, adding:
When every individual up and down the country was told to stay at home in order to protect the NHS, the Tories were instead having a Christmas party which, as a senior staff member has now confirmed, was “not socially distanced”.
If this is true, then the prime minister’s position is untenable and he must remove himself from office immediately.
Read the full story by my colleague Peter Walker here:
Updated
Hello, it’s Léonie Chao-Fong here, taking over from Lucy Campbell.
A global trial of a Covid-19 vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline and Canada’s Medicago has produced “positive efficacy and safety results”, the companies announced. If approved, it would become the world’s first plant-based coronavirus vaccine.
The late-stage trial, which studied 24,000 adults across six countries, found that the overall efficacy rate of the vaccine candidate was 71%, rising to 75.3% against the Delta variant.
The Omicron variant was not circulating at the time of the trial but GSK said it is planning to test the vaccine against the new strain.
GSK and Medicago have sought approval from the UK’s MHRA watchdog, the US Food and Drug Administration, Canadian regulator Health Canada and the World Health Organization (WHO).
Updated
Summary
Before I hand over to my colleague shortly, here is a quick recap of some of the main developments from today:
- Norway introduced stricter rules to limit the spread of Covid, including a cap on the number of visitors in private homes and shortening the hours bars and restaurants can serve alcohol. The country has seen a surge of Covid infections in recent weeks, followed by a rise in the number of hospitalisations. “We really wished we were done with the pandemic. But the situation is now so serious that we must put in place new measures to keep control,” the prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre said. “Therefore it will be a different Christmas holiday this year as well,” he said. No more than 10 visitors will be allowed in private homes, and people must keep a distance of at least one metre from anyone who is not a member of their household. The serving of alcohol must stop at midnight every day, he added.
- Scientists have identified a “stealth” version of the Omicron variant which cannot be detected with the routine tests that public health officials are using to track its spread around the world. The stealth variant has many mutations in common with standard Omicron, but it lacks a particular genetic change that allows lab-based PCR tests to be used as a rough and ready means of flagging up probable cases. Researchers say it is too early to know whether the new form of Omicron will spread in the same way as the standard Omicron variant, but that the “stealthy” version is genetically distinct and so may well behave differently. Story here.
-
Sweden will roll out a raft of measures to curb rising Covid infections, urging renewed social distancing, home-working and the use of face masks on public transport, the government said. “We need to work together to that the situation doesn’t get worse, so today we are presenting further precautionary measures,” the prime minister, Magdalena Andersson said. The measures will take effect from Wednesday.
- Nicola Sturgeon urged Scottish firms to ensure that all staff who can are working from home until the middle of January, telling people to do a lateral flow test “on every occasion” they intend to mix with others over the festive season, whether at work, socialising or going shopping.
-
The UK has reported a further 101 confirmed cases of the Omicron variant, taking the total number of cases across the country to 437. Of the new cases, 72 were confirmed in England, 28 in Scotland, and one in Wales. There have been no new cases reported in Northern Ireland.
-
The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, said early indications suggest the Omicron variant is more transmissible than Delta. Johnson made the comment as he updated his team of ministers on the latest Covid situation at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning. Giving an account of the meeting, the prime minister’s official spokesman said: “The prime minister said it was too early to draw conclusions on the characteristics of Omicron but early indications were that it is more transmissible than Delta.” But the spokesman said there was no debate around the cabinet table on whether to introduce “plan B” of the government’s plans to control the virus this winter.
- The spread of Omicron in Wales is expected to reach its peak by the end of next month, the health minister, Eluned Morgan, said. She said: “We are expecting a significant wave of Omicron to hit Wales. The modelling suggests it will reach its peak by around the end of January, which is why there is an urgency in terms of getting people vaccinated and boosters done as soon as possible.”
- Poland will introduce compulsory Covid vaccinations for doctors, teachers and security service personnel from 1 March, the health minister said, as he announced a raft of new measures to curb the spread of the virus. Niedzielski said the limit on the number of people allowed in public spaces such as restaurants and cinemas would be lowered to 30%, not including vaccinated people, from the current 50%. Businesses will also be required to check customers’ Covid certificates. Nightclubs will be closed from 15 December and on New Year’s Eve. On New Year’s Day, only 100 people will be allowed to enter, not counting those who have been vaccinated. Additionally, travellers from outside the European Union’s Schengen passport-free zone will need to show a negative test result from 15 December and schools will return to distance learning for periods just before and after the Christmas holiday. Niedzielski said that the government was also working on a draft law that would allow employers to check workers’ Covid test results.
-
EU health agencies have recommended that Covid vaccines be mixed and matched for both initial courses and booster doses as the region battles rising cases ahead of Christmas. Evidence suggests that the combination of viral vector vaccines and mRNA vaccines produces good levels of antibodies against the coronavirus, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said in a joint statement. Such an approach “may offer flexibility in terms of vaccination options, particularly to reduce the impact on the vaccine rollout should a vaccine not be available for any reason”, the EMA and ECDC said, while urging people to get fully vaccinated. However, the EMA and ECDC said more research was needed to support the use of mixing and matching in people with weak immune systems, such as older people and those with chronic conditions like cancer, and for two-dose mRNA vaccine regimens.
-
Spain’s health commission approved vaccinations against Covid for children aged five to 11, following a recommendation by the European Union’s health regulator late last month. Spanish authorities expect to start vaccinating children on 13 December as the first doses of Pfizer and BioNTech’s vaccine are expected arrive, the health minister, Carolina Darias, said.
Norway tightens restrictions again amid rising infections
The Norwegian government introduced stricter rules on Tuesday to limit the spread of Covid, including a cap on the number of visitors in private homes and shortening the hours bars and restaurants can serve alcohol.
The country has seen a surge of Covid infections in recent weeks, followed by a rise in the number of hospitalisations.
“We really wished we were done with the pandemic. But the situation is now so serious that we must put in place new measures to keep control,” the prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, told a news conference.
“Therefore it will be a different Christmas holiday this year as well,” he said.
No more than 10 visitors will be allowed in private homes, and people must keep a distance of at least one metre from anyone who is not a member of their household. The serving of alcohol must stop at midnight every day, he added.
Companies hit by the restrictions will receive compensations from the government, the finance minister Trygve Slagsvold Vedum, said.
The government last week reimposed some restrictions on travellers, requiring that anyone arriving in the country must test for the coronavirus and that people wear face masks in most crowded places, but infections have still continued to rise.
France has registered a surge in Covid hospitalisations as a rise in new infections in mid-November translates into patient numbers.
The health ministry reported that the number of patients with coronavirus in hospitals rose by 618 to 12,714, the second-highest net one-day increase this year behind the net increase of 732 on 6 April when the patient tally was above 30,600.
Due to one of Europe’s highest vaccination rates, a rise in new cases now has less impact on hospital numbers than in the spring.
France also reported that the number of patients in intensive care units with Covid rose by 160 to 2,351, the second-highest increase this year. On 6 April, ICU numbers rose by 193 to 5,626.
On Monday, France reported a seven-day moving average of nearly 43,000 new infections per day, a new high for the year, but the rate of increase has been slowing for over two weeks.
Updated
Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, has said she supports an intellectual property waiver on Covid-19 vaccines, so that low and middle income countries can manufacture their own jabs.
Responding to a question from Joe FitzPatrick MSP, asking if she supports a waiver of intellectual property rules to ensure equitable access to Covid vaccines, Sturgeon said:
I do support the calls of the People’s Vaccine Alliance. I certainly call on the prime minister to take whatever action he can to ensure that we get vaccines equitably to the population of the world as quickly as possible. I also take very seriously the responsibility on the shoulders of my government to make sure we are doing everything possible.
Covid is a global crisis. It is very understandable that often we focus on the implications for ourselves and our own country, but it is an unprecedented global crisis. Earlier in the pandemic, the government allocated funding for our own international development budget to provide Covid support for partner countries Malawi, Rwanda, Zambia, and Pakistan. The UK also participates in Covax, which is an important way to help other nations access vaccines.
But it is fundamentally the case, as Omicron is reminding us, that until everybody across the world is safe, none of us are truly safe. So we are very keen to explore further routes that support equitable access to vaccines.
She added that she would write to the prime minister to encourage him to take action on the issue and to offer the full cooperation of the Scottish government.
The first minister’s comments were welcomed by Liz Murray, head of campaigns at Global Justice Now Scotland. Murray said:
The British government has repeatedly blocked efforts to expand access to Covid-19 vaccines around the world through an emergency suspension of intellectual property rules, including vaccine patents. But today, Nicola Sturgeon has made clear that the UK does not do this in Scotland’s name.
The first minister’s statement will be welcomed by all those in the global south who have been calling for this life saving measure for more than a year.
Updated
A businessman who has a severe nut allergy has accused the UK government of endangering his life after he was served nuts and traces of nuts during hotel quarantine after returning from a work trip to South Africa.
Richard Lace, 40, went into anaphylactic shock and had to call for an ambulance after eating two mouthfuls of a rice dish at a hotel at Heathrow on 3 December.
The Department of Health and Social Care has now released him from quarantine on medical grounds – something Lace had requested to no avail four days previously – after it was contacted by the Guardian.
“It really is ridiculous. They had the information from day one. They had two opportunities to get it right and not kill me and I can’t trust that they won’t kill me on the third occasion,” he said.
Read the full story here: Quarantined man goes into allergic shock after Heathrow hotel serves nuts
Finland’s prime minister came under sustained criticism on Tuesday after it was revealed she stayed out dancing until the early hours on the weekend despite knowing she had been exposed to Covid-19, AFP reports.
Sanna Marin, 36, apologised on Monday after the gossip magazine Seiska published photos of her dancing in a Helsinki nightclub with friends on Saturday night until almost 4am, hours after her foreign minister, Pekka Haavisto, tested positive for coronavirus.
“My husband and I... had been out to eat, been shopping in town, seen friends and also spent time [enjoying] the evening and nightlife,” the Social Democrat leader wrote on Facebook.
She added that she was told by an official that the coronavirus guidelines did not require her to isolate, despite having been in contact with an infected person.
“I should have used better judgement and double-checked the guidance given to me. I am very sorry for not understanding that I needed to do that,” Marin wrote.
A poll commissioned by TV channel MTV3 found that two-thirds of respondents thought Marin’s night out was a “serious mistake”.
Opposition parties also slammed Marin for potentially breaking official Covid guidelines and for missing a later text message warning her to isolate.
The finance minister, Annika Saarikko, from the Centre Party, the ruling coalition partner, stopped short of criticising Marin directly.
However Saarikko told the Helsingin Sanomat newspaper that she was “glad I was at home” when she received the text message to isolate, adding that she had cancelled her plans for the next day.
Finland has sustained some of Europe’s lowest incidences of the virus throughout the pandemic, recording more than 196,000 cases and 1,384 deaths in the country of 5.5 million.
However infections are now at an all-time high, with 308 new cases per 100,000 population in the last fortnight. The country has also recorded eight cases of the Omicron variant.
Scientists find ‘stealth’ version of Omicron not identifiable with PCR test
Scientists have identified a “stealth” version of the Omicron variant which cannot be detected with the routine tests that public health officials are using to track its spread around the world, my colleagues Ian Sample and Peter Walker report.
The stealth variant has many mutations in common with standard Omicron, but it lacks a particular genetic change that allows lab-based PCR tests to be used as a rough and ready means of flagging up probable cases.
Researchers say it is too early to know whether the new form of Omicron will spread in the same way as the standard Omicron variant, but that the “stealthy” version is genetically distinct and so may well behave differently.
The stealth variant was first spotted among Covid virus genomes submitted in recent days from South Africa, Australia and Canada, but the difficulty in detecting the variant means it may already have spread more widely. Among the few dozen cases identified so far, none are in the UK.
Read the full story here: Scientists find ‘stealth’ version of Omicron not identifiable with PCR test
Updated
Britain’s lockdown drinking habits may have had fatal consequences. Deaths caused by alcohol in 2020 increased by almost 19%, marking the biggest rise since records began, according to the Office for National Statistics.
There were 8,974 deaths from alcohol specific causes registered in the 12 month period, up from 7,565 deaths in 2019 – the highest year-on-year increase since the data series began in 2001. It bucks a trend in which fatalities from alcohol remained stable for the previous seven years.
In England, the number of people drinking more than 14 units a week increased after the first national lockdown, according to surveys by Public Health England (PHE), and has remained at similar levels since. As pubs shut, drinking at home soared, with off-licence sales of beer rising 31% and spirits 26% compared with 2019.
Dr James Tucker, the head of the government’s data quality hub, said:
There will be many complex factors behind the elevated risk since spring 2020.
For instance, Public Health England analysis has shown consumption patterns have changed since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, which could have led to hospital admissions and ultimately deaths. We’ve seen increases in loneliness, depression and anxiety during the pandemic and these could also be factors. However, it will be some time before we fully understand the impact of all of these.
Close to eight out of 10 of the deaths were from alcoholic liver disease and although alcohol-related cirrhosis can take a decade or more to develop, most deaths occur as a result of acute-on-chronic liver failure owing to recent alcohol intake, a PHE study in July found.
Scotland and Northern Ireland continued to have the highest rates of alcohol deaths, but the fastest rises were in Wales and England. The sharpest rise in deaths in England was in the West Midlands, followed by the south-west and London. Nearly twice as many men died as women, which is consistent with previous years.
Read the full story here: Britain’s drinking deaths rose at record rate in pandemic
Omicron has spread across Denmark, health authorities said on Tuesday after registering large outbreaks of the variant in the east and west of the country.
“We now have society-wide infection with the Omicron variant,” director of the Danish Patient Safety Authority, Anette Lykke Petri, told reporters.
Denmark has so far registered a total of 398 Omicron cases.
Sweden to reintroduce many Covid restrictions as cases rise
Sweden will roll out a raft of measures to curb rising Covid infections, urging renewed social distancing, home-working and the use of face masks on public transport, the government said on Tuesday.
“We see an increased spread of infection, but still from low levels,” the prime minister, Magdalena Andersson, told a news conference. The measures will take effect from Wednesday.
“We need to work together to that the situation doesn’t get worse, so today we are presenting further precautionary measures,” Andersson said.
Cases in Sweden have started to rise in recent weeks after a relatively calm autumn.
Hospitalisations and the number of patients requiring intensive care are still among the lowest per capita in Europe but have also started to creep up.
Sturgeon urges Scottish firms to let staff work from home if possible until mid-January
There will be no changes this week to Covid restrictions in Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon has said, while telling the Scottish public “it is time for all of us to go back to basics”.
She urged employers to ensure that all staff who can are working from home until the middle of January, telling people to do a lateral flow test “on every occasion” they intend to mix with others over the festive season, whether at work, socialising or going shopping.
At her regular Covid briefing to MSPs, Sturgeon confirmed 99 cases of the Omicron variant in Scotland, an increase of 28 since yesterday [see 2.47pm.].
To give a sense of the speed of increase – albeit at this stage from a low level – the figure I reported this time last week was nine.
She said health officials estimate the “R” number associated with the new variant may be well over 2, and that there are confirmed cases in nine of Scotland’s 14 health board areas, “suggesting that community transmission is becoming more widespread, and possibly more sustained, across the country”.
Underlining the significance of this speed of increase, Sturgeon warned:
The sheer weight of numbers of people who could be infected as a result of increased transmissibility and some immune evasion will create this pressure even if the disease the new variant causes in individuals is no more severe than Delta.
Updated
UK reports another 101 Omicron cases, bringing total to 437
The UK has reported a further 101 confirmed cases of the Omicron variant, the UK Health Security Agency said on Tuesday, taking the total number of cases across the country to 437.
Of the 101 new cases, 72 were confirmed in England, 28 in Scotland, and one in Wales. There have been no new cases reported in Northern Ireland.
Earlier, the prime minister, Boris Johnson, said early indications suggest the variant is more transmissible than Delta [see 12.23pm.].
Johnson made the comment as he updated his team of ministers on the latest Covid situation at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning.
Giving an account of the meeting, the prime minister’s official spokesman said:
The prime minister said it was too early to draw conclusions on the characteristics of Omicron but early indications were that it is more transmissible than Delta.
But the spokesman said there was no debate around the cabinet table on whether to introduce “plan B” of the government’s plans to control the virus this winter.
Confirming that a total of 99 Omicron cases have so far been found in Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon told MSPs on Tuesday that the R number of the new variant could be above two.
Updated
Omicron wave likely to peak in Wales at end of January, Morgan says
The spread of Omicron is expected to reach its peak by the end of next month, the Welsh health minister Eluned Morgan has said.
She told a press briefing in Cardiff:
We are expecting a significant wave of Omicron to hit Wales. The modelling suggests it will reach its peak by around the end of January, which is why there is an urgency in terms of getting people vaccinated and boosters done as soon as possible.
Morgan said health boards are again setting up more vaccination centres, including walk-in and drive-through clinics with longer opening hours. Local government officials, firefighters and students are to provide support to the clinics and Morgan called for volunteers to come forward.
No new restrictions have been introduced in Wales in response to the new variant, but the first minister, Mark Drakeford, is due to announce the Labour-controlled government’s latest coronavirus review on Friday.
The Welsh Conservatives are worried that the government could extend its vaccine passport scheme (which currently affects settings such as nightclubs) to other hospitality businesses.
The shadow health minister, Russell George, said:
The possibility of extending vaccine passports to hospitality business is a slap in the face for one of the worst-affected sectors of the pandemic. They are coercive, ineffective, anti-business, and have no evidence base whatsoever.
Updated
Concern has been growing in Norway over a sharp rise in coronavirus infections across the country, including 29 confirmed cases of the Omicron variant.
That includes 17 Omicron cases reported in Oslo, many of them linked to a super-spreader event at a nightclub where 130 Covid cases were reported.
Amid concern over rising hospitalisations, combined with the impending flu season, the Norwegian government is expected to announce new restrictions on Tuesday evening.
In the last 24 hours, Norway reported 4,117 new infections, an increase of 1,240 on the same day last week.
Most striking, however, has been the outbreak linked to a Christmas dinner at Oslo’s Louise nightclub. There were 130 Covid cases recorded from the event, with Norwegian media quoting Tine Ravlo, an infection control doctor, suggesting that perhaps half could be Omicron.
The club had been booked by Scatec, a renewable-energy company, for its Christmas party, despite the fact that only vaccinated employees were invited and had been required to take a rapid Covid test the day before.
It appears that some guests had recently returned from South Africa and may have been infected there.
Updated
In this instalment of the Guardian’s Lost to the virus series, Sirin Kale tells the story of Michele Brown, a mother-of-two who carefully shielded until the UK government said it was safe to see friends and family. She was fully vaccinated against Covid, but had a suppressed immune system and had no idea how her existing conditions could affect her. She died last July at the age of 58.
Modern society has largely exiled death to the outskirts of existence, but Covid-19 has forced us all to confront it. Our relationship to the planet, each other and time itself can never be the same again.
Here is the long read from Jacqueline Rose: Life after death: how the pandemic has transformed our psychic landscape
Poland to introduce mandatory Covid jabs for some workers
Poland will introduce compulsory Covid vaccinations for doctors, teachers and security service personnel from 1 March, the health minister said on Tuesday, as he announced a raft of new measures designed to curb the spread of the virus.
While the number of daily coronavirus cases in the European Union’s largest eastern member has stabilised, it remains at a high level and authorities fear that the new Omicron variant could trigger a rise in infections.
“There are no signals of a clear downward trend, and … there is a risk that the Omicron mutation will appear,” Adam Niedzielski told a news conference. “These two factors require us to take decisive action.”
Poland has not reported any cases of the Omicron variant yet.
Niedzielski said the limit on the number of people allowed in public spaces such as restaurants and cinemas would be lowered to 30%, not including vaccinated people, from the current 50%.
Businesses will also be required to check customers’ Covid certificates.
Nightclubs will be closed from 15 December and on New Year’s Eve. On New Year’s Day, only 100 people will be allowed to enter, not counting those who have been vaccinated.
Additionally, travellers from outside the European Union’s Schengen passport-free zone will need to show a negative test result from 15 December and schools will return to distance learning for periods just before and after the Christmas holiday.
Niedzielski said that the government was also working on a draft law that would allow employers to check workers’ Covid test results.
The country of around 38 million has so far reported 3,704,040 cases of the coronavirus and 86,205 deaths.
Updated
Switzerland will deploy up to 2,500 military personnel to help regional authorities cope with the coronavirus pandemic, the government said, again tapping the armed forces to support the healthcare system as Covid cases rise.
Switzerland and tiny neighbour Liechtenstein have reported more than 1 million confirmed cases of Covid and nearly 11,300 deaths since the pandemic began.
Cases have been on the rise again, straining some hospitals as the Swiss government tries to keep the economy open amid what it calls a “critical” situation.
Last week, it tightened rules on wearing masks and producing a certificate to prove a person is vaccinated or has recovered from the virus.
Switzerland, which used the military twice last year to help out, will let cantons request help to care for or transport patients and to support vaccinations if their civil defence, fire department and private-sector resources are inadequate.
The government said it would will ask parliament to approve the measure, that will run until 31 March.
Nearly 79% of hospital intensive care units are now occupied, of which patients with coronavirus account for just over 30%.
Only 66% of the Swiss population – or three out of four people aged 12 or older – is fully vaccinated, despite repeated public campaigns to encourage holdouts to get jabbed.
Updated
Tottenham Hotspur FC’s plans for a busy period of games have been hurt by a coronavirus outbreak at the club. A number of first-team players and two members of the coaching staff have reportedly tested positive ahead of further PCR tests on Tuesday.
With a must-win Europa Conference League game against Rennes on Thursday then Premier League games at Brighton and Leicester, Spurs’ preparations look set to be severely impacted.
Get the full story here: Tottenham games under threat following Covid outbreak at club
Updated
Denmark’s health minister, Magnus Heunicke, has tested positive for Covid-19 and is self-isolating in a hotel in Brussels, the ministry said in a statement.
Heunicke had stayed in his hotel room and not been in contact with other ministers, Denmark’s permanent representation in the EU told Reuters.
Updated
Early indications Omicron is more transmissible than Delta variant, Johnson says
The early indications are that the Omicron variant appears to be more transmissible than Delta, the UK prime minister has said.
Boris Johnson made the comment as he updated his team of ministers on the latest Covid situation at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning.
Giving an account of the meeting, the prime minister’s official spokesman said:
The prime minister said it was too early to draw conclusions on the characteristics of Omicron but early indications were that it is more transmissible than Delta.
But the spokesman said there was no debate around the cabinet table on whether to introduce ‘Plan B’ of the government’s plans to control the virus this winter.
As of Monday, 336 cases of Omicron have been identified in the UK - 261 in England, 71 in Scotland and four in Wales.
The health secretary, Sajid Javid, told MPs on Monday that cases of Omicron in people without any travel history have been confirmed in the UK, meaning it is now being transmitted within the community.
Updated
EU health bodies recommend mix-and-match of Covid vaccines
EU health agencies have recommended that Covid vaccines be mixed and matched for both initial courses and booster doses as the region battles rising cases ahead of Christmas, Reuters reports.
Evidence suggests that the combination of viral vector vaccines and mRNA vaccines produces good levels of antibodies against the coronavirus, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said in a joint statement on Tuesday.
Such an approach “may offer flexibility in terms of vaccination options, particularly to reduce the impact on the vaccine rollout should a vaccine not be available for any reason”, the EMA and ECDC said, while urging people to get fully vaccinated.
Their endorsement comes after a major study on Monday said a first dose of AstraZeneca or Pfizer/BioNTech shots followed by a Moderna vaccine nine weeks later induced a better immune response.
However, the EMA and ECDC said more research was needed to support the use of mixing and matching in people with weak immune systems, such as older people and those with chronic conditions like cancer, and for two-dose mRNA vaccine regimens.
Longevity of protection offered by vaccines has been under scrutiny and the world is scrambling to trace the Omicron variant as governments impose fresh restrictions, and speed up rollouts of vaccines to children and booster doses.
Official rollout of vaccines for five- to 11-year-olds will start next week in Europe.
The EMA and ECDC recommendations are also meant to help EU member states with their own vaccination campaigns before any formal EU-wide approval as the health agencies continue studying data on mixing vaccines.
The US has given the green light to mix and match, while the World Health Organization is assessing the approach.
The EMA and ECDC’s review did not consider vaccines that are not approved in the European Union. Covid shots from AstraZeneca, Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson have been authorised for use in the bloc.
Many countries have deployed a mix and match well before robust data was available as nations faced soaring infection numbers, low supplies and slow immunisation over some safety concerns.
Updated
Spain approves Covid vaccination for children aged 5 to 11
Spain’s health commission has approved vaccinations against Covid for children aged five to 11, following a recommendation by the European Union’s health regulator late last month.
Spanish authorities expect to start vaccinating children on 13 December as the first doses of Pfizer and BioNTech’s vaccine are expected arrive, the health minister, Carolina Darias, told reporters in Brussels, where she was attending a meeting of EU health ministers on Tuesday.
The decision comes as Spain, with a nationwide vaccination rate of nearly 80%, seeks to address an acceleration of Covid cases.
Inoculating children and young people, who can unwittingly transmit the virus to others, is considered a critical step towards taming the pandemic.
EU countries such as Germany, Italy and the Czech Republic have already approved vaccinations for children under 12.
Updated
Uganda has detected cases of the Omicron variant in travellers coming into the country, the first infections to be reported in east Africa, AFP reports.
The cases were detected in people screened at Entebbe International airport who flew in from five different countries, Ugandan medical authorities said in a statement.
Five had come from Nigeria, two from South Africa and two from the United Arab Emirates. The others had travelled from the Netherlands and the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo.
Two weeks after first being identified in South Africa, Omicron has been found in about 40 countries around the world.
Some European governments have reintroduced tough measures, including mandatory mask-wearing and social distancing, while travel restrictions, mostly targeting southern Africa, have also come into force.
Uganda has been spared the worst of the pandemic after imposing some of the first and strictest containment measures on the continent.
The country has recorded 127,708 infections, of which 3,258 have been fatal, according to the health ministry. But, as in other countries in the region, inoculation has been slow due in part to hesitancy surrounding the jabs and poor access to vaccines.
The country of 45 million people has vaccinated only 7.6 million people, according to the latest government figures.
Updated
Wales’ health minister has said booster vaccinations will be offered to all eligible adults by the end of January.
PA Media reports that Eluned Morgan MS confirmed people would still be called in priority order of age and vulnerability, but stressed the importance of people coming forward when contacted to “extend their protection”.
NHS Wales is said to be giving more than 19,000 jabs a day after ramping up the booster programme in response to the spread of the Omicron variant.
The Welsh government said it was aiming in the coming weeks to almost double the rate vaccinations are being administered to more than 200,000 a week.
Five million vaccines have so far been administered in Wales.
Health boards are again setting up more vaccination centres, including walk-in and drive-through clinics with longer opening hours. Local government, fire services and students will then provide support to the clinics, along with volunteers.
Meanwhile, the minister said a request for assistance has been sent to the military.
Morgan will hold a press conference on Tuesday with the deputy chief medical officer, Dr Gillian Richardson, about the progress of the booster rollout.
She said:
The vaccines become less effective over time so it’s really important that people come forward to have a booster when invited to extend their protection.
Millions of people have accepted the vaccine, it has saved lives and helped prevent serious illness in tens of thousands of people.
Please wait until you are invited for your booster and prioritise your appointment over everything else to support the hard-working staff and volunteers at our vaccination centres, who will be spending a second festive period helping to keep Wales safe.
With high levels of the Delta variant in the community and the emergence of the Omicron variant, you can continue to disrupt the transmission of the virus by wearing a face covering in indoor public places, getting tested, self-isolating when positive and getting vaccinated.
Updated
Hundreds of cases of the new Omicron variant have now been confirmed in the UK and experts have called for a renewed focus on vaccination rates.
As of 4 December, just over eight in 10 people aged 12 or older UK-wide had received two doses of a coronavirus vaccine, according to data from the UK Health Security Agency, while 89% had received a first dose.
This means about 6 million eligible people may still be unvaccinated, based on ONS population figures as opposed to counts of GP records. So who are they?
My colleagues Niamh McIntrye and Tobi Thomas have examined the data, which shows disparities in uptake across age, region and ethnicity.
Read their report here: As many as 6 million eligible Britons may not have had a Covid jab. Who are they?
Good morning from London. I’m Lucy Campbell, I’ll be bringing you all the latest global developments on the coronavirus pandemic for the next eight hours. Please feel free to get in touch with me as I work if you have a story or tips to share! Your thoughts are always welcome.
Email: lucy.campbell@theguardian.com
Twitter: @lucy_campbell_
Today so far
- Prof Tim Spector, from the Covid Zoe app, said that in about 10 days’ time the UK could have more cases of Omicron than some countries it had put on the travel red list. The professor of genetic epidemiology said: “The official estimates are about 350-odd Omicron cases, and because the current testing is missing a lot of those, it’s probably at least 1,000 to 2,000 I would guess at the moment.”
- Dr Jeffrey Barrett, director of the Covid-19 genomics initiative at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, has agreed that Omicron would take over from Delta in the UK as the dominant variant of coronavirus “within a matter of weeks”. He said: “I think we can now say that this variant is spreading faster in the UK than the Delta variant at the same time, and that’s something that I think was unclear until very recently.”
- Austria’s general lockdown will be lifted on Sunday as planned – however, restrictions will stay in place for the unvaccinated.
- Germany’s outgoing health minister Jens Spahn said travel curbs that limit arrivals to the European Union are important until more is known about the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
- EU health commissioner Stella Kyriakides said: “We are facing a very challenging epidemiological situation in all members states with the Covid-19 pandemic, made especially challenging with the appearance of the Omicron variant.”
- She said she would urge ministers to step up vaccinations and, when necessary, to promote other non-pharmaceutical measures, such as requiring the wearing of masks and social distancing.
- In France, it is hoped a combination of vaccination booster shots and more rigorous social distancing will avoid the need for renewed lockdowns or curfews. Nightclubs will be shut for four weeks and requirements for mask-wearing in schools will be tightened.
- The Netherlands is drafting in soldiers to support hospitals as Covid cases surge.
- The Office of National Statistics says that from the week ending 13 March 2020 to the week ending 26 November 2021, the number of excess deaths above the five-year average in England and Wales was 128,740.
- The UK’s justice secretary Dominc Raab has insisted that, regarding the allegations of a Christmas party last year at Downing Street while the rest of London was in tier three Covid restrictions, “there was no party, and there were no rules breached”. Raab also insisted “We don’t think plan B is required. Why? Because of the success of the vaccine programme.”
- UK hospitals have cancelled at least 13,000 operations over the last two months as they struggle to cope with record demand for NHS care and people sick with Covid-19.
- GSK has released new data from early-stage studies, citing that its antibody-based Covid-19 therapy with US partner Vir is effective against all mutations of the new Omicron coronavirus variant.
- New York City has expanded its array of Covid-19 mandates on Monday, setting vaccine requirements for children as young as five. This is on top of the mandates required for all private employees.
- People in US counties that voted for Donald Trump are nearly three times more likely to die from Covid-19 than those who live in counties that voted for Joe Biden.
- In Australia, senior health officials have rejected claims made by Queensland senator Gerard Rennick that Covid-19 vaccinations amount to “experimenting” on children after the Liberal senator questioned the safety of the vaccine for children aged five to 11 in a Senate inquiry.
More than 40 countries have confirmed the presence of Omicron. Our Science Weekly podcast today explores what we know about the new variant.
Lucy Campbell will be here shortly to guide you through the rest of the day’s Covid news from the UK and the rest of the world.
Updated
Head of the World Health Organization’s Europe division, Hans Kluge, has been giving a press briefing this morning. Here are some of the key lines to come out of it
- Kluge said mandatory vaccinations against the coronavirus are an “absolute last resort” and “only applicable when all feasible options to improve vaccination uptake have been exhausted.”
- He also said that vaccine mandates should not contribute to inequalities in accessing healthcare.
- He reiterated that it is yet to be seen with the Omicron variant where it will be more transmissible, or whether it will lead to milder cases of Covid-19.
- He said that we now know that vaccine-driven immunity wanes after around 30 weeks.
Here is an updated map illustrating the severity of Covid caseloads across Europe at the moment.
Austria's general lockdown to end Sunday as planned – restrictions will still apply to unvaccinated
A quick snap from Reuters here that unvaccinated people will remain in lockdown when Austria’s general lockdown lifts on Sunday, new chancellor Karl Nehammer confirmed this morning, the day after he took office.
It was no longer a question of whether the general lockdown would end on Sunday as planned but how, and consultations on that would take place on Wednesday, Nehammer told a news conference.
Updated
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) weekly deaths bulletin for England and Wales has been released this morning, as it always is on a Tuesday. Here are the key findings:
- In the week ending 26 November 2021, 11,467 deaths were registered; this was 636 fewer deaths than the previous week and 10.5% above the five-year average (1,087 more deaths).
- Of the deaths registered, 817 mentioned “novel coronavirus (COVID-19)”, accounting for 7.1% of all deaths; this was a decrease in the number of deaths compared with the previous week (952 deaths, 7.9% of all deaths).
- From the week ending 13 March 2020 to the week ending 26 November 2021, the number of excess deaths above the five-year average in England and Wales was 128,740.
Germany’s outgoing health minister said that travel curbs that limit arrivals to the European Union are important until more is known about the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
“Until we know more, we need to be careful and so travel restrictions are important to keep the entry in Europe and Germany as low as possible,” Jens Spahn told reporters as he arrived for a meeting of EU health ministers in Brussels.
Reuters remind us that late in November, EU states agreed to impose travel restrictions on seven southern African countries after they reported several cases of the Omicron variant, which is considered highly infectious.
EU sources said on Monday there was no immediate plan to ease the restrictions, quashing a media report that cited a diplomat saying this could be the case.
Ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, EU health commissioner Stella Kyriakides said: “We are facing a very challenging epidemiological situation in all members states with the Covid-19 pandemic, made especially challenging with the appearance of the Omicron variant.”
She said she would urge ministers to step up vaccinations and, when necessary, to promote other non-pharmaceutical measures, such as requiring the wearing of masks and social distancing.
Andrew Sparrow has launched our UK politics blog for the day, and I imagine he will be fully taken up with the fallout from the whistleblower claims about the UK government’s handling of the evacuation of Kabul.
I will continue to bring you UK and global Covid lines here.
Updated
More than 40 countries have confirmed the presence of Omicron. In the UK, scientists have been increasingly expressing their concern about the new variant. Some have speculated there could be more than 1,000 cases in the country already, and that it could become the dominant variant within weeks.
In today’s Science Weekly podcast, to get an update on what we know about the Omicron variant, and how quickly it might be spreading, Madeleine Finlay speaks to Nicola Davis, the Guardian’s science correspondent.
Updated
In Australia, senior health officials have rejected claims made by Queensland senator Gerard Rennick that Covid-19 vaccinations amount to “experimenting” on children after the Liberal senator questioned the safety of the vaccine for children aged five to 11 in a Senate inquiry.
It comes after Rennick posted anti-vaccine content on Facebook making similar claims.
At a fiery hearing on Tuesday, the head of the Therapeutic Goods Administration, John Skerritt, rejected suggestions it was “nothing much” for children to catch Covid-19 and warned that misinformation was hindering its work.
The chair of the Senate Covid-19 committee, Labor’s Katy Gallagher, urged Rennick to “talk to a few parents whose children have struggled to breathe with Covid”, suggesting he “give [her] a call” – in reference to her daughter’s struggle with the illness.
Read more of Paul Karp’s report here: Liberal senator Gerard Rennick’s vaccine claims condemned by health officials in Covid inquiry
Updated
Overnight, the Belfast Telegraph has broken a story that fake vaccine certificates for use in Northern Ireland are being sold in Ireland. Allison Morris reports:
Fake vaccine cards are being sold online ahead of the introduction of fines for those in breach of the Covid certification scheme in Northern Ireland.
Blank vaccine cards that can be filled in with personal details are being sold by a man based in the Irish Republic for €50.
The reports are similar to claims last month that digital vaccine passes for Ireland were changing hands for €350.
Updated
By the way, as part of his media round this morning, Dominic Raab, the UK government justice minister, has again insisted that there will be no need for any further Covid restrictions in England.
Reuters quote him telling the BBC: “We don’t think plan B is required. Why? Because of the success of the vaccine programme.”
Updated
Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett writes for us today, arguing that the explosion of Covid PTSD cases is a mental health crisis in the making:
The NHS forecasts that nationally, there will be 230,000 new cases of PTSD as a result of Covid-19. It is not only social care and medical staff who will be affected. Those who lost loved ones, and those who have been very ill or hospitalised (35% of Covid-19 patients who were put on a ventilator go on to experience extensive symptoms of PTSD) may also suffer.
Then there are those living with the effects of domestic and sexual abuse, which may have worsened due to lockdown, and children and young people whose lives changed immeasurably due to our shift to a state of emergency. I imagine that some women whose birthing experiences were marked by the pandemic will also be experiencing symptoms.
Unfortunately, the current system is still not fully equipped to deal with this explosion in trauma cases. The Royal College of Psychiatrists says the NHS is already facing the biggest backlog in its history of those waiting for mental health help. As of September, 1.6 million people were waiting for treatment, and the college says that more funds than those committed to by the government are desperately needed.
Read more here: Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett – The explosion of Covid PTSD cases is a mental health crisis in the making
Prof Tim Spector, from the Covid Zoe app, said that in about 10 days’ time the UK could have more cases of Omicron than some countries it had put on the travel red list.
The professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London told BBC Breakfast: “The official estimates are about 350-odd Omicron cases, and because the current testing is missing a lot of those, it’s probably at least 1,000 to 2,000 I would guess at the moment.
“And we are expecting this to be doubling about every two days at the moment, so if you do your maths – say, assumed it’s 1,000 at the moment, and you think it’s going to be doubling every two days, you can see that those numbers are going to be pretty (high) certainly in about 10 days’ time. By that time, we’ll probably have more cases than they will in some of those African countries.
“So I think these travel restrictions do perhaps have their place initially, when cases are really low here and really high in the other country, but when we reach that equilibrium, there’s very little point in having them in my opinion.”
PA Media quotes him saying that data from the Zoe symptom study app suggests that about half of all cases at the moment of Delta are being “missed” because they are not presenting with “classic” Covid symptoms of fever, new and persistent cough and a loss or change of smell or taste.
“Omicron is probably more, much more similar to the mild variants we’re seeing in people who have been vaccinated with Delta than anything else,” he said.
“And so it is going to be producing cold-like symptoms that people won’t recognise as Covid if they just believe the official government advice.”
Here’s a reminder of England’s current travel restriction red list.
Updated
With the caveat that until scientists get more data, there is a lot of speculation around, but Dr Jeffrey Barrett, director of the Covid-19 genomics initiative at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, has agreed this morning with those suggesting that Omicron would take over from Delta in the UK as the dominant variant of coronavirus “within a matter of weeks”.
PA Media quotes him telling the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: “I think we can now say that this variant is spreading faster in the UK than the Delta variant at the same time, and that’s something that I think was unclear until very recently. I am pretty confident that it’s going to take over probably in a matter of weeks.”
Asked about the implications of that, he said: “Well, we don’t know and that’s the really critical question, of course, is how many of those cases of which there will likely be a large number will lead to severe disease?
“And a number of people including Dr Fauci have hypothesised that this variant may be more mild or less likely to cause severe disease than previous variants of the virus.
“I think what we have seen so far in South Africa, for example, is possibly consistent with that, but it’s really much too soon to say, and the reason for that is that this variant seems to be able to infect individuals who either have been vaccinated or previously have been infected.
“And we know that second infections or breakthrough infections of vaccinated individuals tend to be more mild. So the fact that so far we have seen not very many severe cases of Omicron, maybe because it is infecting these individuals with some amount of immunity and that’s good news that they aren’t having tonnes of severe disease, but I think it is too soon to assume that fundamentally Omicron is more mild than say Delta.”
Updated
GSK says sotrovimab antibody-based Covid-19 therapy is effective against Omicron variant
A quick one from Reuters here which sounds like good news. Britain’s GSK has released new data from early-stage studies, citing that its antibody-based Covid-19 therapy with US partner Vir is effective against all mutations of the new Omicron coronavirus variant.
The data, yet to be published in a peer-reviewed medical journal, shows that the companies’ treatment, sotrovimab, is effective against all 37 identified mutations to date in the spike protein, GSK said in a statement.
Raab: 'There was no party, and there were no rules breached'
The justice secretary and former foreign secretary Dominic Raab was mostly questioned on Sky News this morning about the whistleblower report which has condemned the Foreign Office over its handling of the Kabul evacuation. However, there was time for him to be asked once again about allegations that there was a Christmas party at Downing Street last year while London was under tier three restrictions, which would have forbidden it.
He was asked about the contrasting approach outlined by policing minister Kit Malthouse yesterday, who said police should investigate, after Raab himself said on Sunday they do not look at historical crimes. This morning, Raab said:
I was directly quoting from what the Metropolitan police say, this is a matter for them. They said that in relation to Covid regulations, it wouldn’t routinely investigate retrospective breaches. So I was simply pointing to what the police themselves are saying.
No 10 have been very clear. There was no party and there’s been no breach of the rules and frankly, you’ll appreciate I’ve answered the questions for you, answered the questions on Sunday, which I’m very happy to do, but I don’t have any further to add. Pretty categorically.
To be honest with you, it’s for the police. They’ve already had the facts sent to them. We’ve seen two Labour MPs ask for it. But it’s ultimately a matter for the police. And just on the fundamental point, No 10 have been very clear. There was no party, and there were no rules breached.
Updated
The Morrison government is considering citing Covid restrictions as a reason for officials to stay away from the Beijing Winter Olympics, as calls grow for Australia to follow the US in a diplomatic boycott.
Guardian Australia understands while an announcement could be made soon, the government is unlikely to take as strong a position as the Biden administration, which blasted China over “ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity”.
The Australian government was still considering the language to be used, with suggestions that it may not be presented as a boycott. Instead, it is weighing up saying officials will not go because Covid restrictions meant they would mostly be confined to their hotel rooms.
The New Zealand government said on Tuesday it would not send diplomatic representatives at a ministerial level to the Winter Olympics, citing “a range of factors but mostly to do with Covid”.
Read more of Daniel Hurst’s report here: Australia may use Covid restrictions to justify diplomatic boycott of Beijing Winter Olympics
People in counties that voted for Donald Trump are nearly three times more likely to die from Covid-19 than those who live in counties that voted for Joe Biden, according to a study by National Public Radio.
NPR examined deaths per 100,000 people in about 3,000 counties across the US since May 2021. According to NPR, 1 May was chosen as the start date as it is roughly the time when vaccines became universally available to adults.
The study found that areas that voted for Trump by at least 60% in November 2020 had death rates 2.7 times higher than counties that voted heavily for Biden.
The study also found that counties that voted for Trump by an even higher percentage had lower vaccination rates and higher Covid-19 death rates.
Charles Gaba, an independent analyst who helped review NPR’s methodology, said that in October, the reddest 10th of the country saw death rates six times higher than the bluest 10th.
“Those numbers have dropped slightly in recent weeks,” he said. “It’s back down to 5.5 times higher.”
Read more of Maya Yang’s report here: People in counties that voted Trump more likely to die from Covid – study
Updated
Hello, it is Martin Belam here in London taking over from Samantha Lock in Sydney. It is the Dominic Raab, the justice secretary, doing the media round for the government today. I shall have some quotes from him in due course. Here’s a reminder of the UK Covid situation.
Over the last seven days there have been 330,918 new coronavirus cases recorded in the UK. Cases have increased by 9.1% week-on-week.
There have been 836 deaths recorded in the last week. Deaths have decreased by 0.2% week-on-week.
Hospital admissions have decreased by 0.8% week-on-week. At the latest count on the UK government’s own dashboard, there were 7,268 people in hospital in total, of whom 900 are in ventilation beds.
Doctors report 13,000 cancelled operations in UK over two months
UK hospitals have cancelled at least 13,000 operations over the last two months as they struggle to cope with record demand for NHS care and people sick with Covid-19.
Figures collected by A&E doctors showed that 13,061 planned surgeries had to be called off during October and November because of shortages of beds and staff.
However, the cancellations occurred at just 40 of the several hundred NHS hospitals across the four home nations, so those 13,061 are likely to be a major underestimate of the scale of the problem.
Dr Adrian Boyle, a vice-president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), which published the data, said the cancellations represented “a stark warning for the months ahead”.
Read the full story here.
Updated
The Cook Islands, a tiny country in the Pacific, has managed to avoid any cases of Covid-19 throughout the pandemic.
On Friday, the country announced its first case: a 10-year-old boy who arrived on a flight from Auckland to Rarotonga, the main island in the country. After days of panic, the case has been declared a false alarm.
“I was honestly going to quit my job and stay home when I found out it was a positive case. I was shocked and scared at the same time,” said Ake Vailoa, who works as a shopkeeper for a small store on the edge of Rarotonga’s main town.
Read the full story here.
Updated
Ukraine has just released their Covid numbers for the past 24 hours.
Another 8,655 new cases of coronavirus were recorded for Monday, 6 December.
A further 467 deaths were also reported, according to a statement from the ministry of health.
Updated
Summary
The Omicron variant of coronavirus is likely to be more widespread in the UK than official numbers suggest owing to patchy monitoring and a time lag in the data, scientists and officials have said.
Ministers said 336 cases had been identified by whole-genome sequencing, but experts said numbers were expected to be much higher given the variant’s potential for exponential growth and the fact it takes five to seven days for a case to be confirmed.
- All international arrivals to the UK are now required to take a pre-departure Covid-19 test to tackle the new Omicron variant.
- Thailand is hoping to forge a more sustainable model of tourism as the country reopens to visitors.
- New York City has expanded its array of Covid-19 mandates on Monday, setting vaccine requirements for children as young as 5 years old. This is on top of the mandates required for all private employees.
- In France, a combination of vaccination booster shots and more rigorous social distancing is hoped to avoid renewed lockdowns or curfews. Nightclubs will be shut for four weeks and requirements for mask-wearing in schools will be tightened.
- The Netherlands is drafting in soldiers to support hospitals as Covid cases surge.
- India has reported another 6,822 new coronavirus cases, the lowest figures in 558 days.
- A leading infectious diseases specialist who monitors variants for a research collaboration led by Harvard Medical School believes the world is seeing “what appears to be a signal of exponential increase of Omicron over Delta” where Omicron is “likely to become the dominant strain in the coming weeks and months”.
Updated
How fast is the Omicron variant spreading?
Over 40 countries have now confirmed the presence of Omicron. And, in the UK, scientists have been increasingly expressing their concern about the new variant. Some have speculated there could be more than 1,000 cases here already, and that it could become the dominant variant within weeks.
To get an update on what we know about the Omicron variant, and how quickly it might be spreading, Madeleine Finlay speaks to Nicola Davis, the Guardian’s science correspondent.
Listen to the Guardian’s latest Science Weekly podcast here.
Mexico's capital rolls out first Covid booster shots
Mexico City officials will begin offering a third Covid-19 vaccine dose to residents over the age of 60 on Tuesday, officials said, part of a government plan to roll out booster shots, Reuters reports.
President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said last week the third doses would be made available as soon as possible, beginning with elderly people who are more vulnerable to the coronavirus.
The first booster shots in the massive capital of nearly 10 million people will be AstraZeneca doses given to residents of the southern Tlalpan neighbourhood, officials told a news conference on Monday. To be eligible, people must have had an initial two doses six months ago.
The health ministry on Monday reported 110 more deaths from Covid-19 and 752 new cases, bringing the death toll since the pandemic began to 295,312 and total infections to 3,902,015.
All international arrivals to the UK are now required to take a pre-departure Covid-19 test to tackle the new Omicron variant.
The tightened requirements have just come into force from 4am (GMT) on Tuesday 7 December.
Travellers will now need to submit evidence of a negative lateral flow or PCR test to enter, which must have been taken a maximum of 48 hours before the departure time. People currently only need to self-isolate until they test negative within two days of arrival.
Updated
Los Angeles county is reporting a third case of the Omicron variant.
The individual is believed to have recently travelled from West Africa and is fully vaccinated, according to a statement from Los Angeles County Health.
The individual had mild symptoms and is self-isolating. Known close contacts are fully vaccinated and have tested negative.
“This latest case of the Omicron variant in Los Angeles County underscores how critical safety measures are while traveling,” said Dr Barbara Ferrer, Director of Public Health. “These requirements include a negative test before boarding your flight, wearing a mask, and not traveling while you are sick. Residents should also consider delaying travel until their and all of their traveling companions are fully vaccinated.”
Updated
India has just released a Covid update with the latest numbers from the past 24 hours.
Another 6,822 new coronavirus cases have been recorded, the lowest figures in 558 days.
India’s active caseload currently stands at 95,014 and is the lowest in 554 days, according to a statement from the ministry of health.
Thailand hopes for sustainable post-Covid comeback
Thailand is hoping to make its idyllic Phi Phi islands a more sustainable model of tourism as the country reopens to visitors, Agence France-Presse reports.
Before the pandemic, Phi Phi National Marine Park attracted more than two million visitors a year and Maya Bay drew up to 6,000 people a day.
Tourists and noisy, polluting motorboats have had a huge impact on the area’s delicate ecology.
“The coral cover has decreased by more than 60% in just over 10 years,” says Thon Thamrongnawasawat of Kasetsart University in Bangkok.
Since the pandemic hit and visitor numbers dwindled to virtually nil, the entire archipelago was forced into convalescence and dozens of blacktip sharks, green turtles and hawksbill turtles have returned.
The government now says it wants to move on from Thailand’s history of hedonistic mass tourism, with Tourism Minister Phiphat Ratchakitprakarn saying the focus would be on “high-end travellers, rather than a large number of visitors”.
Phi Phi national park chief Pramote Kaewnam says boats will no longer be allowed to moor near the beach and will instead drop tourists off at a jetty away from the cove. Tours will be limited to one hour, with a maximum of 300 people per tour.
“Maya Bay used to bring in up to $60,000 a day, but this huge income cannot be compared to the natural resources we have lost,” Pramote said.
Updated
New York City mandates Covid vaccine for children
New York City has expanded its array of Covid-19 mandates on Monday, setting vaccine requirements for children as young as 5 years old. This is on top of the mandates required for all private employees we previously reported.
The most-populous US city set a 27 December as the deadline for all 184,000 businesses within its limits to make their employees show proof they have been vaccinated, Mayor Bill de Blasio said.
In addition, children 5 to 11 years old must get at least one dose by 14 December and those 12 and older need to be fully vaccinated by 27 December to enter restaurants and participate in extracurricular school activities, such as sports, band and dances, Reuters reports.
“Vaccination is the way out of this pandemic, and these are bold, first-in-the-nation measures to encourage New Yorkers to keep themselves and their communities safe,” de Blasio, who leaves office next month, said in a statement.
China has reported 94 new confirmed coronavirus cases for 6 December, up from 61 a day earlier, its health authority confirmed on Tuesday.
Of the new infections, 60 were locally transmitted, according to a statement by the National Health Commission as seen by Reuters, compared with 38 a day earlier.
The new local cases were reported by local authorities in Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang, Yunnan and Zhejiang.
China reported 14 new asymptomatic cases, which it classifies separately from confirmed cases, compared with 44 a day earlier.
There were no new deaths, leaving the death toll at 4,636. Mainland China has had 99,297 confirmed cases.
We have some more information on the new Covid restrictions taking effect in France.
A combination of vaccination booster shots and more rigorous social distancing is hoped to avoid renewed lockdowns or curfews, prime minister Jean Castex said on Monday.
From Friday, nightclubs will be shut for four weeks and citizens will be asked to voluntarily limit private and professional gatherings.
Requirements for mask-wearing in schools will also be tightened.
From 15 December, children aged five to 11 who are overweight or who have a serious health condition will be offered access to vaccination. Children over the age of 12 can already be inoculated.
“Vaccination will be open to 5-11 year olds overweight or suffering from a risk pathology from December 15,” a statement from the ministry of health reads.
Health minister Olivier Veran reiterated vaccination for “the most fragile children” will begin next week and vaccination to all children on 20 December 20.
Dutch hospitals welcome military support
The Netherlands is drafting in soldiers to support hospitals as Covid cases surge, Agence France-Presse reports.
The UMC Utrecht hospital has opened a second care unit which can take patients with Covid-19 from across the region and is being helped by 50 members of the military with medical backgrounds.
“What we are try to do here is to increase the amount of nursing beds that we have for Covid patients,” Martin van Dijk, a Dutch military aid coordinator, told AFP.
“By that, the military tries to support the Dutch hospitals to make sure that no hospital has to say no to a patient, basically.”
This is the second time that the military has been sent in to help at the hospital in the city in the central Netherlands, with the first time being from October 2020 to June this year.
Covid cases in the nation have soared to record levels of more than 20,000 a day in the country of 17 million people.
The Dutch government has warned that hospitals are overstretched, with 2,143 Covid patients in hospital, including 611 in intensive care, accounting for 59% of all ICU beds, according to the latest figures.
Updated
France to shut nightclubs over Covid surge
Nightclubs in France will be ordered to close for four weeks from Friday to counter a Covid surge that has put hospitals under strain, the prime minister said on Monday.
“We will close the nightclubs for the next four weeks. This measure will apply from next Friday until the beginning of January,” Jean Castex, who emerged from quarantine last week after contracting the virus, said.
“We have all had a tendency to lower our guard” in recent weeks, he added.
“The situation demands an individual as well as a collective effort,” Castex said in a televised address.
A raft of new measures will be coming into force according to a statement from the ministry of health.
France has confirmed only 25 cases of the new Omicron variant but officials say the number could jump significantly in the coming weeks.
On Sunday, the health ministry reported more than 42,000 cases in the previous 24 hours, and more than 11,000 patients in hospital - the highest number since August - with 2,000 in intensive care.
À nous : pic.twitter.com/XljOcl5bF1
— Jean Castex (@JeanCASTEX) December 6, 2021
Hello and welcome back to our coronavirus live blog.
I’m Samantha Lock and I’ll be taking you through all the latest Covid developments as they happen.
A leading infectious diseases specialist who monitors variants for a research collaboration led by Harvard Medical School believes the world is seeing “what appears to be a signal of exponential increase of Omicron over Delta.”
“It’s still early days, but increasingly, data is starting to trickle in, suggesting that Omicron is likely to outcompete Delta in many, if not all, places,” Dr Jacob Lemieux said in an interview with the Associated Press.
Others say it’s too soon to know how likely it is that Omicron will spread more efficiently than Delta, or, if it does, how fast it might take over.
“There’s still a lot of uncertainty ... but when you put the early data together, you start to see a consistent picture emerge: that Omicron is already here, and based on what we’ve observed in South Africa, it’s likely to become the dominant strain in the coming weeks and months and will likely cause a surge in case numbers,” Lemieux added.
Meanwhile, nightclubs in France will be ordered to close for four weeks from Friday to counter a Covid surge that has put hospitals under strain.
Here’s everything you might have missed over the past few hours:
- New Covid restrictions are to be introduced in Norway after a recent increase in infections.
- Britain’s health minister said there is now community transmission of the Omicron variant across regions of England.
- The Czech government will order Covid-19 vaccinations for people working in hospitals and nursing homes as well as police officers, soldiers and some other professions and all citizens aged 60 and older.
- A new range of pandemic restrictions will be imposed in Poland this week.
- Italy tightened restrictions on people still not vaccinated, limiting their access to an array of places and services.
- Children in the Philippines’ capital Manila returned to school after a near two-year suspension.
- India’s cases of the Omicron variant rose to 21 over the weekend, officials said, while Nepal and Thailand detected their first cases.
- South Africa is preparing hospitals for more admissions, as the Omicron variant pushes the country into a fourth wave of infections.
- Austria’s general lockdown will end on 11 December for those who have been vaccinated.
- All private employers in New York City will have to mandate Covid-19 vaccinations for their workers.
