An Exciting Day……Not!

A day of various bits and bobs, including sorting through old paperwork and doing lots of shredding. I also caught up with the series ‘Anne’ about Hillsborough which is excellent, last episode tonight I think - a brilliant performance by Maxine Peake. 

Day 660 / Day 27 of Plan B (for my record only)
The ONS weekly infection survey of private households to 31st Dec shows an estimated 3.7m had Covid in the UK (3.27m in England) the highest recorded; with 1 in 15 with the virus in England (up - 1 in 10 in London); 1 in 20 in Scotland (up); 1 in 20 in Wales (up); and 1 in 25 in NI (up). 194,747 new cases reported across the UK today (in reality the highest yet given yesterday’s record figure included several days for 2 countries). Covid cases in Scotland have increased by 87% in the last week. The Cabinet has agreed to extend Plan B rules in England. Over 20 English hospital trusts have now declared a critical incident, including the NHS Norfolk and Waveney Clinical Commissioning Group. One ambulance service is asking people with suspected strokes or heart attacks to get friends or relatives to drive them to hospital. Asymptomatic people in England will not need a follow up PCR test from 11th Jan if they test positive on a LFT and record it on the Govt website to initiate contract tracing (does NOT change the need to self isolate and all those with symptoms must take a PCR test) - exceptions are: people who need to access the £500 T&T support payment; people participating in surveillance programmes or research; the 1m at most risk and potentially eligible for new treatments (should get a PCR test kit at home by mid Jan). Scotland has follow suit (don’t know about their exceptions). For a while I’ve not understood why the T&T process didn’t start when you got a positive LFT, but waited for the PCR result). Scotland has also followed England in exiting isolation after 7 days if no fever and a negative LFT on days 6 & 7. The PM announced that pre-departure testing for arrivals into England will be scrapped for double vaccinated travellers from 4am Fri, plus they only need a negative LFT by Day 2 not a negative PCR. Sir Keir Starmer has tested positive for Covid, he last tested positive with a LFT on 27th Oct - only 10 weeks ago, and he had his booster jab on 6th Dec (only 1 month ago) - this just show how easy it is to catch (presumably) the Omicron variant.