Covid-19 infections surge towards record levels

COVID-19 infections have risen sharply across most of the UK and are nearing record levels in England, while Scotland and Wales have reached an all-time high, new figures show. Across the UK as a whole, 4.26 million people were likely to have had coronavirus last week – just short of the 4.30m in the first week of 2022, which was the highest total since estimates began. Northern Ireland is the only nation where infections are believed to be falling, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said. The steep rise in infections across much of the country is being driven by the Omicron BA.2 variant, a more transmissible form of Omicron. The figures are further evidence Covid-19 is becoming rapidly more prevalent in the UK and come as numbers of people in hospital with the virus continue to rise.

Around one in 16 people in private households in England (3.5m people) are likely to have had Covid-19 in the week to March 19 – up from one in 20 (2.7m) the previous week – the third week in a row infections are thought to have risen.

The number of new UK Covid-19 infections is likely to have climbed as high as half a million a day, analysis suggests. Infections are estimated to have more than doubled in two weeks, from 244,600 a day by February 23, to 520,200 by March 9, the ONS said. There were likely to have been 3.1m new UK infections to March 9 – eight times the number recorded on the Government’s Covid-19 dashboard. The figures suggest the virus could be at higher levels than in the Omicron-led surge at the start of the year.