Wales' Deputy Chief Medical Office has urged everyone in the country to "protect yourself and your loved ones" from coronavirus, as case rates surge to their highest ever levels in the pandemic.
Describing the current situation as a "worrying time", Dr Chris Jones has encouraged people across Wales to get their booster vaccine and follow measures to curb the spread of the virus. The latest figures show case rates have risen sharply to more than 910 cases per 100,000 people – the highest levels since the start of the pandemic, according to a statement issued by the Welsh Government.
Read more: Everything you need to know about Omicron symptoms
"Some 6,000 new infections are being confirmed daily, the majority of which will be caused by the new omicron variant," continued the statement.
On Tuesday the latest data from Public Health Wales, covering the period up to 9am on Boxing Day, showed 12,378 new cases in the country. This is a huge jump from the previous figures released the previous day, covering the 24 hours up to 9am on December 24, which showed 5,335 new positive cases. Meanwhile, more than 54% of people in Wales have had their booster vaccine, the aim being for eligible adults to be offered the booster by the end of December to offer greater protection against the mutant strain.
The variant, which UK authorities first became aware of in November, now accounts for 90% of all cases in London and is the dominant strain across the UK. Worryingly, the symptoms of Omicron are very different to what we were originally told to look out for, meaning that many are mistaking it for for a common cold. A continuous cough, high temperature and loss of taste and smell were all the tell tale signs of Covid and we had to isolate and get a test if we had any of them. This is still the advice now, but experts are saying that there are actually symptoms of the new Omicron variant which are not covered within the three "traditional" symptoms and people need to be aware.
A runny nose, sore throat and a headache are increasingly being reported as the first symptoms that some Omicron sufferers are feeling. According to health science company Zoe, the first symptoms which can appear as quickly as 48 hours after you’ve been infected with Omicron include runny nose, dry/scratchy throat, headache, fatigue and sneezing. Full details about the symptoms of the variant can be found here.
Welsh Covid rules could 'push people over the border' on New Years Eve, say hospitality owners
Thousands of people are expected to escape strict Covid restrictions in Wales on New Year's Eve by crossing the border to visit nightspots in English towns and cities, according to hospitality owners.
Leaders of the nightlife industry in Wales are angry that they will lose trade to their counterparts in England because Welsh nightclubs have been ordered to shut and pubs told to put in social distancing measures. In England, no restrictions on the hospitality industry have been announced.
But the Welsh government said on Tuesday that its restrictions were proportionate, with the latest seven-day coronavirus rate per 100,000 people rising to 1,004 – the highest since the pandemic began. About 6,000 new infections are being confirmed daily, the majority caused by the Omicron variant.
Nick Newman, the chair of the Cardiff Licensees Forum, told The Guardian newspaper that he expected many people to leave Wales for England. “It’s 40 minutes from Newport to Bristol and it’s easy to get from north Wales into Manchester or Liverpool. English businesses are going to benefit. We’re hugely disappointed with the stance the Welsh Government is taking, especially not presenting the evidence that links the virus to the hospitality industry.”
Mark Finlay, the operations manager for a number of pubs and bars in Wrexham, also close to the border, said people were bound to pop over to places like Chester for a night out with few restrictions: “It’s frustrating that a few minutes down the road you can celebrate a normal New Year’s Eve but we’re not allowed that opportunity here. For us it will be an average night serving people at tables. There won’t be the normal party atmosphere. I’m fully expecting everyone to go to Chester.”
Tory MP says 'the principalities are out of step with England'
The "principality" of Wales is damaging people's liberties and the economy, a Conservative MP has told a radio station. Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, who is Conservative MP for the Cotswolds, told Times Radio that Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland are "principalities" and that they have been "overly cautious" in the response to Covid.
In the interview with Times Radio the MP was asked: "How concerned are you about England being out of step with the rest of the country?"
He replied: "I think it's the other way around. I think the principalities are out of step with with with England. I think they have been overly cautious. I think they're doing more damage to their economies than they need to. I think they're doing more damage to people's liberties than they need to. I just don't think the evidence unless as I say the data coming out today is very different. I don't think the evidence is there for any further measures."
The MP went on: "I think there's a lot of confusion at the moment in the data. I think people have been pretty cautious over Christmas. I think unless the data is very, very different to that which it was before Christmas the prime minister would be do well just to wait and see what happens in the next few days because by next week we will have a very, very clear idea of whether these large numbers of infections are going to translate into hospital cases. But at the moment I would urge caution because damage to the economy and the damage to individuals by locking them down unnecessarily."
Wales is country, not a principality, despite often being referred to as one. It has not been a principality since the 1500s. If you want to know the background to that you can read it here.
High Covid death rates in UK are 'now history', says leading immunologist
Omicron is “not the same disease we were seeing a year ago” and high Covid death rates in the UK are “now history”, a leading immunologist has said.
Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at Oxford University and the government’s life sciences adviser, said that although hospitalisations had increased across the UK in recent weeks, the disease “appears to be less severe and many people spend a relatively short time in hospital”. Fewer patients were needing high-flow oxygen and the average length of stay was down to three days, he said.
He said while there had been an increase in the number of people on ventilators in London - up to 232 as of 27 December - it remained below 400, a marker being watched for when considering further restrictions.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme he said: “The horrific scenes that we saw a year ago of intensive care units being full, lots of people dying prematurely, that is now history, in my view, and I think we should be reassured that that’s likely to continue.”
He said that over the course of multiple waves of Covid, including Delta and Omicron, “the incidence of severe disease and death from this disease has basically not changed since we all got vaccinated”. His comments came after Paul Hunter, professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia, told the BBC people with Covid should be allowed to "go about their normal lives as they would do with any other cold" — you can read those comments here.
Prof Bell was speaking the morning after it was announced that England would not introduce any new coronavirus measures before New Year's Eve.
Coronavirus case rates surge to their highest ever levels in the pandemic
The latest figures show case rates have risen sharply to more than 910 cases per 100,000 people – the highest levels since the start of the pandemic, according to a statement issued by the Welsh Government.
"Some 6,000 new infections are being confirmed daily, the majority of which will be caused by the new omicron variant," continued the statement.
On Tuesday the latest data from Public Health Wales, covering the period up to 9am on Boxing Day, showed 12,378 new cases in the country. This is a huge jump from the previous figures released the previous day, covering the 24 hours up to 9am on December 24, which showed 5,335 new positive cases.
The total number of deaths within 28 days of a positive Covid test has now risen to 6,651 in Wales with a further three fatalities since the last data was released. The previous figures were released on Boxing Day and covered the 24 hours up to 9am on December 24. That showed 5,335 new positive cases.
The latest seven-day infection rate across Wales, based on the seven days up to December 23, has risen to 1,004.1 cases per 100,000 population. On Christmas Eve it was 662.3 per 100,000 population while on Boxing Day it was 724.9 cases per 100,000 population.
Meanwhile, more than 54% of people in Wales have had their booster vaccine, the aim being for eligible adults to be offered the booster by the end of December to offer greater protection against the mutant strain.
Health experts say Italy faces paralysis under quarantine rules
Health experts urged the Italian government on Monday to relax Covid quarantine rules, saying that the country otherwise risked paralysis as the highly infectious Omicron variant spreads.
Under current rules, people who have come into close contact with a Covid sufferer have to self-isolate for seven days if they are vaccinated and for 10 days if they have not had a vaccine.
Nino Cartabellotta, head of the Gimbe health foundation, said each positive person had, on average, five to 10 close contacts, and predicted that within two weeks some one million people in Italy might have come down with coronavirus.
"That would mean there could be five to 10 million contacts to be sent to quarantine, and this is not possible," Cartabellotta told Radio Cusano Campus.
Fabrizio Pregliasco, a virologist, echoed his comment: "It's clear that at this stage and with this diffusion of Omicron, we must consider changes in the way we intervene, otherwise we're heading for a generalised lockdown."
Changes to self isolation rules in Wales and across the UK have been made to avoid such a problem occurring here.
In Wales, "fully-vaccinated adults and children aged five to 17 who are identified as contacts of someone who has tested positive for Covid-19 will now be asked to take a daily lateral flow test for seven days instead of self-isolating. This is known as daily contact testing," said Mark Drakeford.
"People who have daily negative tests will be able to continue going to work as normal, while following all the steps to keep themselves safe, including limiting the number of people they mix with as much as possible."
For people who have not been doubly vaccinated and identify as a close contact, they must still self-isolate for 10 days. Children under five are exempt from self-isolation if they are close contacts.
Madrid struggles with testing demand as infections reach record highs
Demand for free Covid testing kits provided by Madrid's regional government far outstripped supply on Tuesday, with long queues forming outside pharmacies as nationwide infections continued to climb amid the Omicron variant's rapid expansion.
Spain's coronavirus infection rate hit a new record, rising to 1,360 cases per 100,000 people, measured over the preceding 14 days, from 1,206 cases reported on Monday, a five-fold rise since the beginning of December, according to health ministry data. read more
Around 250 new deaths in the past seven days were reported on Tuesday, bringing the total to 89,253.
But hospitals remained under much less strain than in previous waves of the pandemic as the government reported that 80% of the population older than 60 had received a booster vaccine dose.
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