‘Lessons have been forgotten’: is the UK ready for a new Covid variant?

BA.2.86 known to have infected dozens of people in the UK as of last weekend , including 28 at a Norfolk care home.

Pirola began raising red flags when first detected in Israel in July , with cases confirmed now in more than a dozen countries, including Denmark and the US .

Government started its Covid vaccine rollout last week for over-65s and immunocompromised people.

The NHS in August hit a record 7.6 million people on waiting lists, and has been beset by strike action leading to the cancellation of 839,327 hospital appointments.

Susan Michie , professor of health psychology at UCL , agrees that as we find ourselves in a position where “we really can’t see what’s happening” because of the lack of testing.

Michie is firm that we need to take a population-wide approach to reducing the level of infection’.