Omicron explosion in UK: Govt says it will be dominant strain in 48 hours

Since the discovery of Omicron variant last month, fears of it becoming dominant across the globe and taking over Delta variant, which wreaked havoc early this year, have been high.

These fears seem to be coming true as Omicron is fast becoming the dominant strain in UK. The first death due to Omicron has also been reported in London, confirmed by UK PM Boris Johnson on Monday.

UK Health Secretary Sajid Javid said on Monday, "since last week, we've learnt two things about this variant. The first is that no variant of Covid-19 has spread this fast. There are now 4,713 confirmed cases of omicron in the UK."

Also read: Omicron could cause 75,000 deaths in UK by April-end, warns study

Stressing on the high number of cases in the coming days, Javid added, "while Omicron represents over 20% of cases in England, we've already seen it rise to over 44% in London and we expect it to become the dominant Covid-19 variant in the capital in the next 48 hours."

As fears persist and grow with each passing day, queues of people could be seen to get vaccinated in London.