Lancashire's Covid hotspot as 'ultra-transmissible' Kraken variant begins to spread across UK
Colne Waterside, in east Lancashire, has rates of 348 cases per 100,000 residents according to the most recent government data. Darwen Town was the next highest with rates of 282.2/100,000 with no other area surpassing the 200 mark.
Around one in 20 people in England are likely to have had Covid-19 over the festive period, along with one in 18 in Wales and one in 16 in Northern Ireland. Meanwhile, the country is experiencing its worst flu season for a decade and ambulance handover delays at hospitals are at a record high. The current wave of coronavirus could prove to be one of the biggest the UK has seen. Infections peaked at 4.3 million last winter during the spread of the Omicron variant of Covid-19, but this was topped a few months later during the wave caused by the Omicron BA.2/3 subvariants, when infections reached a record 4.9 million.
But it does come as news of a new variant emerges, and is spreading across the UK. The new variant, dubbed as the 'Kraken', or more formally, XBB 1.5, has been described by some health experts as "ultra transmissible". It is currently spreading across the UK, with reports of the case already made in the USA, NottinghamshireLive reports.
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