Explainer: The Omicron variant has taken hold for more than a week and we can start to see the effect it is having on hospitalisations for the first time
Omicron cases are surging in the UK and as the variant has taken hold for more than a week we can start to see the effect it's having on hospitalisations for the first time.
In the three weeks since then, the daily average has risen more than five fold and it doesn't show signs of slowing. If there are fewer hospitalisations per case that means either the virus itself is less severe or that we are better able to deal with it due to things like the vaccine. In terms of public health it doesn't really matter which is true, it's good news either way - we can tolerate more cases without overwhelming the NHS.
It's still a little too early to look at deaths, but if we break down the case rate by age we can see that the recent rise is driven by under-60s.According to virologist Dr Stephen Griffin, associate professor at the school of medicine, University of Leeds, it's"far more likely that younger people are mixing both at work and socially" than older people during the busy Christmas period.
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