(New thread, as the old one, with 300+ comments, hard to navigate).
BBC finally taking the new surge in COVID cases seriously. A little (well, a lot) too late, alas, since nobody seems to have got the message yet. The Boris Johnson effect - clown heads in the sand.
This report went up an hour ago, reporting a rapid UK rise in cases & hospitalisations. This has a knock-on effect on others in hospital, and on the NHS in general, of course.
Another BBC piece, this one by James Gallagher, their 'Health and science correspondent'. He'd earlier bought into Boris Johnson's "herd immunity" type line - playing down long-term worries, assuming everyone would get enough immunity that it would fizzle out and become as harmless as a cold, population-wide.
At least he now admits that was wrong. "BA.4 and BA.5 can 'substantially escape' the protection from either vaccination or infection. A study in Science also showed the original Omicron was like a 'stealth virus' that left limited protection if you came across Omicron again."
Key line from the article: "There is no political appetite to return to any restrictions." Well, of course - there's no political appetite for anything other than winning votes & staying in power.