Britain’s Covid outbreak continues to worsen with another 33,364 cases

Britain’s second wave of Covid is continuing to worsen, with health bosses today recording another 33,364 cases of the disease amid fears a mutated strain of the disease is rapidly spreading across the country.

Department of Health statistics show daily infections have risen 64.7 per cent in a week, with today’s figure up from the 20,263 posted last Monday. Deaths are still stable, however, with today’s fatality count being 7.3 per cent down on last week’s 232. 

It comes amid growing fears that millions of families face living under draconian Tier Four restrictions until Easter, with Britain’s Covid crisis continuing to escalate.  

Boris Johnson sparked fury on Saturday night after he cancelled Christmas for 16million people living in London and across the South East. Shops, gyms, hairdressers and beauty salons have been ordered to shut again, with residents told not to leave Tier Four.   

Matt Hancock yesterday hinted tougher measures will be needed even after the one-day Christmas amnesty for the rest of the country, saying the virus was now ‘out of control’. And ‘Professor Lockdown’ Neil Ferguson today claimed the harshest curbs may ‘possibly’ have to stay until the spring, when millions of Brits will have received their jab.   

But parts of the region which escaped the harshest measures have seen a dramatic rise in positive tests since the start of December, bolstering fears Number 10 will need to take tougher action after Christmas to tackle the new variant of Covid. 

MailOnline’s analysis today revealed that Hastings in Sussex saw cases rise almost eight-fold since the beginning of the month, with the borough’s infection rate soaring from 96 positive tests per 100,000 people in the week ending December 1 to 732.8 over the seven-day spell that finished December 15. 

Crawley in Sussex saw cases rise almost five-fold since the beginning of the month, with the borough’s infection rate soaring from 40.9 positive tests per 100,000 people in the week ending December 1 to 200.2 over the seven-day spell that finished December 15

In other coronavirus developments today: 

• Britons could be facing a shortage of food over the festive period with the port chaos caused by France’s Covid travel ban set to last until Christmas Eve and Emmanuel Macron insisting lorry drivers must register a negative Covid test before being allowed into the country;
• Number 10 has called for calm as panic-buyers continue to queue outside supermarkets across the country – but Sainsbury’s has reassured customers that all the ingredients needed for a traditional Christmas dinner are already in the country;
• Boris Johnson is facing a mounting Tory rebellion over his latest Covid crackdown as Conservative MPs demand the Government recall Parliament so ministers can ‘come clean’ over the new mutant strain of the disease, which a top German virologist claimed he was ‘not so worried’ about; 
• Chaos erupted at British airports, with more than 30,000 travellers stranded and hundreds of flights cancelled as more countries moved to isolate the UK in a desperate bid to contain the mutated strain of coronavirus;
• The mutated coronavirus spreading rapidly in the UK will likely become the dominant global strain, a SAGE scientist warned today as Gibraltar became the fifth place outside of Britain to confirm a case of the new variant;
• The FTSE 100 plunged further into the red, losing more than £45billion in value as panicked investors reacted to the devastating economic threat of a toughened lockdown, the new coronavirus strain and the continued Brexit deadlock;   
• The temporary purpose-built NHS Nightingale hospitals constructed for £220million to help fight the coronavirus pandemic cannot open because there are not enough staff to adequately service them, doctors have warned.

It comes after a SAGE expert warned today that the mutated coronavirus spreading rapidly in the UK will likely become the dominant global strain, as Gibraltar became the sixth place outside of Britain to detect a case of the new variant.

Calum Semple, professor of outbreak medicine at the University of Liverpool, said the new variant would ‘out-compete all the other strains’ because it has the evolutionary advantage of being able to spread more easily.

The strain – called VUI-202012/01 – has already been confirmed in Denmark, Gibraltar, the Netherlands, Australia and Italy, There have also been unverified reports of at least one case in Belgium.

France, and South Africa also believe they have cases of the mutation, but these have not been confirmed. French health minister Olivier Veran said it is ‘entirely possible’ the new variant is already circulating in France, despite tests not picking it up yet, while officials in South Africa say they’ve detected a strain very similar to the UK version.

Scotland and Wales have both picked up cases of the strain in recent weeks, although it is spreading predominantly in London and the South East of England, where it’s thought to account for 60 per cent of all new infections.

It is now present in all parts of the UK apart from Northern Ireland, but First Minister Arlene Foster said it’s ‘probable’ the virus is already circulating there, too.

When asked on Sky News whether the mutant coronavirus will become the dominant strain around the world, Professor Semple said: ‘I suspect it will, or strains like it will.

‘Because the virus has the evolutionary advantage in transmitting more quickly, it will out-compete all the other strains, and so it will naturally do that.

‘As immunity comes into the community more widely, then you’ll start to see more pressure on the virus and you’re more likely to see other escapes of other variations.’