First British Omicron victim was unvaccinated says step-son
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It comes after experts previsouly warned that lateral flow tests may have been failing to detect thousands of Omicron cases every day.
But now, health chiefs are insisting that the rapid kits aren’t any less effective at spotting the variant compared to preivous variants like Delta.
The new variant has fast become the dominant strain in London, with the rest of England tipped to follow the curve too.
Dr Jenny Harries, HSA chief executive, said: “Our data shows that LFD tests are similarly able to detect Covid-19 in individuals who have been exposed to Omicron as in those exposed to previous variants. This is very encouraging.
“As we all work to limit the high levels of transmission of this variant over the Christmas period, we are urging people to test regularly, particularly before attending social gatherings.
“As always, the booster vaccine remains the best protection against infection. Please come forward to receive your booster as soon as possible.”
Today (Friday Decemeber 14), there has been 93,045 new cases (people positive) of COVID-19 reported, bringing the total up to 11,190,354.
This has broken the daily record for the third day in a row.
And there were 111 new Covid deaths reported, with 7,611 patients in hospital, 875 of whom required ventilators.
This is a breaking story. More to follow.
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