Boris Johnson today faced demands to urgently clarify the situation over Britain’s first Omicron death and 10 hospitalisations after warnings that the announcements may have sparked unnecessary panic.
The Prime Minister yesterday confirmed that a patient had died after testing positive for the variant.
But he gave no extra details, such as the person’s age, condition, vaccination status or whether Covid was even the primary reason for their death. And health officials have refused to provide any further information.
Experts today told MailOnline answers are desperately needed regarding the yet-to-be revealed details of the fatality, as otherwise the Government ‘is placing further strain on people’s trust in their judgements, which is already pretty thin’.
One prominent expert last night made the point that the first Omicron fatality could have been hit by a bus and just coincidentally tested positive.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) also yesterday revealed 10 Britons had been hospitalised, but refused to say whether any had received their booster.
And in further confusion today, Dominic Raab claimed the true toll was 250 — before later back-tracking to state nine and then 10 Britons had been hospitalised with the variant, saying he originally misheard the question.
Ministers today accused him of showing the ‘same failure’ as Boris Johnson.
Tory rebel ringleader Steve Baker told MailOnline ‘public confidence relies on ministers obviously gripping facts’.
Asked how many people were hospitalised with the super strain, the Justice Minister told Sky News the figure was ‘in the low hundreds, I think 250 the last time I looked’. But 15 minutes on BBC Breakfast, Mr Raab said ‘I think we’ve got nine people who are in hospital with it’
The UK Covid alert level was raised from level 3 to level 4 after the UK reported another 1,239 confirmed cases of the Omicron variant
Professor Robert Dingwall, one of Britain’s leading sociologists, told MailOnline: ‘If the government is to make a convincing case for seeing Omicron as more threatening than South African scientists are suggesting, more information is needed about the circumstances of this death.
‘Obviously, patient confidentiality needs to be protected, but releasing general information about the patient’s age, health status, including prior vaccination and source of infection, and primary cause of death should not compromise this.
‘Otherwise, the government is placing further strain on people’s trust in their judgements, which is already pretty thin.’
Boris Johnson yesterday revealed the UK’s first death due to Omicron on a visit to a vaccination clinic in Paddington, west London.
He said: ‘Sadly yes Omicron is producing hospitalisations and sadly at least one patient has been confirmed to have died with Omicron.’
Mr Johnson did not reveal the age of the person who died, or if they had underlying health conditions, which made them vulnerable, or whether Omicron was the leading cause of their death or a secondary factor.
Adding to confusion, Mr Raab stated 10 times more people had been hospitalised with Omicron than the true number.
Mr Raab was asked on Sky News this morning: ‘You said a significant number are in hospital. How many?’
He said: ‘The last I saw was in the low hundreds, I think 250 the last time I looked.
‘But of course the data is being updated all the time.’
He added: ‘The problem is the rate at which it is transmitting and if that continues we will see those numbers increase very dramatically.
‘Then we know a proportion of those hospitalised will possibly die or have a very serious suffering of the omicron variant.’
Appearing on BBC Breakfast, the Justice Secretary said: ‘I know we’ve had one death.
‘I think we’ve got nine people who are in hospital with it or still at a relatively low number and we’re tracking that very carefully, but the data is shifting all the time.’
Asked the same question on ITV, Mr Raab said: ‘It’s 10 at the moment.’
But a spokesperson for the UKHSA said 10 people had been admitted to hospital with the Omicron variant as of yesterday.
They added: ‘This is people who were diagnosed with Omicron before or upon being admitted to hospital. The 250 figure is an incorrect one.’
And a Ministry of Justice spokesperson said they ‘don’t know where’ the number came from.
Some 807 Covid-infected Britons were hospitalised on any given day in the week to December 7, the latest date figures are available for.
In a third interview this morning, Mr Raab clarified there were 10 Omicron hospitalisations when he was quizzed over the confusion on ITV’s Good Morning Britain.
After being interrupted, he said: ‘Can I answer the question? I understand you like ranting at your politicians in the morning but can I answer the question because it’s a fair challenge and I want to answer it.
‘First of all, I misheard one of the questions around whether it was hospitalisations of Omicron-related patients or more generally, but the figures are: one death from Omicron, 10 in hospital, and I can tell you the latest daily hospitalisations (for all Covid strains) run at 900.’
SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford said: ‘This is extraordinary. All Governments are going to have to make decisions to control the spread of the virus.
‘Knowing the difference between nine and 250 in a hospital is pretty fundamental. Dominic Raab is showing the same failure to be over the detail as his boss Boris Johnson.’
And Tory rebel ringleader Steve Baker told MailOnline: ‘Public confidence relies on ministers obviously gripping facts. If they have not gripped the facts how can they have asked the right questions?
‘This certainly does nothing to persuade me I am making a mistake in voting No today.’
The Prime Minister faces a 70-strong Tory revolt during a Commons vote on Plan B restrictions, with MPs branding the curbs a ‘softening up exercise’ for a full lockdown.
Pictured above is the current pace of the booster programme (green bars) and how it will have to ramp up to hit the million jabs a day target (red bars). NHS bosses warn scaling up the programme will be ‘incredibly difficult’
Professor of medicine and consultant oncologist Karol Sikora said the Government should release more details about the Omicron death to put people’s minds at ease.
‘Have they had booster? Are they elderly?,’ he said.
‘There are all sorts of nuances to this thing, and we’re not being given proper information.’
He added that given the average age of Covid fatalities in the UK, and that the individual may have died while being infected with Omicron, as opposed to because of the variant, there was no reason to panic and the Government should calm fears rather than stoke them.
‘The average age of death of Covid is 82.5 so a lot of 82-year-old people die in a year, at any one time,’ he said.
‘No details have been released, I suspect it’s just some old boy that’s tested positive, he may have died in his sleep or with a heart attack, who knows?
‘It is unnecessarily alarming.’
Professor Sikora said his suspicion is that the silence regarding whether the person was vaccinated or not indicated to him that the person died of another cause while they had Omicron.
‘I suspect that it’s a death, which is unfortunate, but is due to something else, and it just happens to be Covid positive that’s why they’re not making a big noise about them being vaccinated or not,’ he said.