There is good news though!
Covid is still very much present, and daily cases could soon exceed 300,000 a day thanks to the BA.5 strain, a leading study has suggested.
According to the Zoe Health Study, there are 285,507 daily symptomatic cases in the UK, which is a 27 per cent increase from last week's figures of 225,464. Officials are keeping a close eye on the stats since the last high was in March and came in with around 350,000 daily cases.
The latest uptick in cases could be down to the BA.5 variant, which is the most dominant strain currently circulating in the UK.
Speaking to the Express, Professor Tim Spector warned that cases could very well increase more over the next week. He said that BA.5 is particularly good at "immune escape" which in turn causes an "increase in reinfections in people in spite of vaccines and natural immunity."
Spector points to a "large number of festivals" happening in the near future, which could skyrocket infections in a similar fashion to what we saw
after the Queen's Jubilee.
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Via Unsplash[/caption]
There is good news though.
While the latest strain does look to spread easier, it also appears that symptoms are milder. Fewer deaths have also been reported.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) classified new strains, BA.4 and BA.5, as "variants of concern" and warned that covid is far from over.
"It is encouraging that we are not seeing an increase in intensive care unit admissions, but we are monitoring data closely and assessing the possible impact of subvariants BA.4 and BA.5," Dr Mary Ramsay from the UK Health Security Agency told the BBC
on June 17. "As we enter summer, it's still important to remember that Covid-19 has not gone away, and to get vaccinated to reduce the risk of becoming seriously ill with the virus."
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