Covid infections continue to rise across the UK, driven by the Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants of the virus.
New figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that 2.7 million people in private households are estimated to have had Covid-19 last week, up 18% from 2.3 million the previous week.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, said the UK was now in “a substantial wave of infection” which underlines that coronavirus “is not just a problem in winter”.
The latest data from the #COVID19 Infection Survey show infection rates have continued to increase across all four UK countries in the most recent week, likely driven by the Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 variants https://t.co/Q25Zeim8Yb pic.twitter.com/QFAx3stcXR
— Office for National Statistics (ONS) (@ONS) July 8, 2022
An immunologist warns that a new strain of Covid could be causing new symptoms on those infected, particularly at night, the Independent reports.
Professor Luke O’Neill from Trinity College Dublin told a Irish radio: “One extra symptom from BA.5 I saw this morning is night sweats.”
“The disease is slightly different because the virus has changed,” O’Neill warned.
He added: “There is some immunity to it - obviously with the T-cells and so on - and that mix of your immune system and the virus being slightly different might give rise to a slightly different diease, strangely enough night sweats being a feature.
“But very importantly, if you are vaccinated and you’re boosted, it doesn’t progress into severe disease is the message to keep reminding people.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here