CRISIS POINT
Omicron wave will soar past last January’s peak and ‘could overwhelm NHS within weeks’
THE NHS could be in “serious peril” and overwhelmed within weeks due to Omicron spreading like wildfire in the UK, experts say.
Though uncertainties remain over the impact of the virus strain, there is a possibility that the wave will soar past January’s peak.
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Covid case rates are not far behind the level seen at the start of the year, but severe illness is currently far lower, with 800 admissions and 120 deaths a day.
Prof Graham Medley, a member of the Government’s scientific advisory panel Sage, said: “We’re probably now at the level that we have been at the past, sort of back in January, and it does look as though it’s going to continue beyond that and go over it.”
Prof Medley said “very large” numbers of people could be admitted to hospitals if infections continue to soar and spill into older age groups.
“We could see numbers of people being admitted to hospital getting very large and certainly going over the 1,000, maybe up to 2,000 a day, that we’ve managed to keep the Delta variant below,” he said.
“It was sort of below 1,000 since July without any restrictions, but I think that is going to be very, very difficult or are very unlikely to happen.”
Pressed on the possibility of the NHS being overwhelmed next month, the expert from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) said: “I think so, there is that possibility.”
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UK Health Security Agency chief Dr Jenny Harries warned the NHS could be in “serious peril” because of the Omicron wave.
Dr Harries defended the testing regime for travel saying it was crucial “particularly when we can foresee a very large wave of Omicron coming through and our health services potentially being in serious peril”.
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DOUBLING TIME
Dr Harries told MPs at the Commons Transport Committee the Omicron coronavirus variant was “probably the most significant threat we’ve had since the start of the pandemic”.
The growth of the variant is now less than two days, she claimed.
Dr Harries said: “I’m sure for example, the numbers that we see on data over the next few days will be quite staggering compared to the rate of growth that we’ve seen in cases for previous variants.
“The difficulty is that the growth of this virus, it has a doubling time which is shortening – ie it’s doubling faster, growing faster.
“In most regions in the UK it is now under two days. When it started we were estimating about four or five.”
Both experts said there were questions remaining about the severity of illness caused by Omicron, and how this will impact the NHS.
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Studies from South Africa have claimed that although it is faster spreading, it causes more mild symptoms and there are fewer people being hospitalised or dying.
Prof Medley said the UK is in a “very different position to this time last year, in the sense that the majority of people have been vaccinated” and there is more immunity.
“The fact that we are much more immune than we were generally means that the virus will appear to be much less severe,” he said.
However, this will not stamp out hospitalisations, because high case numbers always means more people needing hospital care.
Prof Medley warned: “Individually, we have a much lower risk but the numbers of infections means that even though individually we’re at less risk, at a population level (the) number of people ending up in hospital could get very large.”
He added it was “very hard to predict in real time exactly what’s happening on any day” but that Omicron “has been increasing quite dramatically”.
With Christmas just over a week away, and Covid cases rocketing, demand for PCR and lateral flow tests has crippled the system.
There have been shortages of both.
It comes as daily lateral flow tests have become a necessity for anyone living with an Omicron Covid case under new Government rules.
Dr Jenny Harries said the NHS is experiencing “unprecedented demand” for PCR tests, and that the demands for lateral flow tests “have been absolutely astounding”.
But she claimed there were enough of both.
On lateral flows, Dr Harries said: “One of the really important things to know is it wasn’t that we don’t have tests in country, it’s actually about getting them delivered.”
She said there were plans to ramp up PCR capacity over the winter, but we “clearly couldn’t predict a variant like Omicron”.
Professor Adam Finn, a member of the vaccine panel JCVI, said the wave of Omicron was just taking off across the country.
He told BBC Breakfast: “The wave is coming very fast and in fact alarmingly fast – if anything faster than ever. So it really is a race at the moment.
“The more immunity that we’ve all got the less of a problem this is going to be, but I’m afraid it is going to be a serious problem either way.
Prof Finn said he was “very concerned” about the current daily infections, adding hospital numbesr will start to "rise steadily now over the next week and maybe over Christmas as well”.
But he said boosters took effect in the body quickly.
The boosters jabs are the UK’s main defence against Omicron.
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WIth three doses, a person is estimated to get 75 per cent protection against infection with symptoms, and likely more against severe disease.
It’s less than against Delta (in the high 90s), and two doses are not considered strong enough to avoid catching the strain.
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