If you have had Covid in the past six months, it should leave you "relatively well protected" from the omicron variant as breakthrough cases begin to emerge in the UK.
Professor Tim Spector, who helped found the Covid Zoe app, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that data was still being analysed, but said: "We've definitely had cases reported where they had one of the previous variants, six to 12 months before and they got reinfected.
"We're not seeing many who've had recent infections. So it could be that if you've been infected more in the last six months, then you are relatively quite well protected."
He did warn, however, that omicron appears to be able to bust through the boosters in terms of infections.
Prof Spector added: "We are getting lots of breakthrough infections in people have had two or three vaccinations and that's more than we saw before."
Police in eastern Germany have carried out raids while investigating alleged threats to kill a state governor and others by opponents of Covid-19 restrictions and vaccinations.
Five properties in Dresden and one in the nearby town of Heidenau were being searched in an investigation of suspected preparations for a serious act of violence, police said on Twitter.
The investigation was triggered by a report last week on ZDF television that a group on messenger service Telegram discussed plans to kill Saxony's state governor, Michael Kretschmer, and other members of the state government.
Dresden is the capital of Saxony, which has seen frequent protests against coronavirus policy and has Germany's lowest vaccination rate.
According to the report, the group's 103 members shared a rejection of vaccinations, the state and the current coronavirus policy.
It featured audio messages in which people urged opposing policy measures "with armed force if necessary," directed against Kretschmer and others.
Google has informed its employees that they will lose pay and eventually be fired if they do not follow its Covid-19 vaccination rules, CNBC reports.
A memo circulated by Google's leadership said employees had until December 3 to declare their vaccination status and upload documentation showing proof, or to apply for a medical or religious exemption, according to the report.
After that date, Google said it would start contacting employees who had not uploaded their status or were unvaccinated and those whose exemption requests were not approved.
Employees who have not complied with the vaccination rules by January 18 will be placed on "paid administrative leave" for 30 days, followed by "unpaid personal leave" for up to six months and termination.
When contacted by Reuters, Google did not directly comment on the CNBC report, but said, "we're committed to doing everything possible to help our employees who can get vaccinated do so, and firmly stand behind our vaccination policy."
People in France aged 65 who have not yet had a booster shot will lose the validity of their health pass starting today.
The “passe sanitaire” was introduced in the summer and makes full vaccination against Covid-19, a recent recovery or negative test obligatory for visiting any restaurant or cafe, inter-city train travel and going to cultural venues like cinemas or museums.
The French government says some 400,000 people aged 65 and over who are eligible for the booster shot have yet to take it, which is 12 per cent of those aged 80 and above and 10 per cent of those aged 65 to 79.
Over 65s without a booster shot will see the QR code in their health pass generated by a mobile phone app automatically deactivated.
The rule will be expanded across all age groups starting on January 15. The only option for people without a booster - other than to get one - will be to have a negative test a maximum of 24 hours old.
France has already carried out almost 16 million booster shots and is confident of reaching its target of 20 million before Christmas.
France reported on Tuesday over 63,400 positive Covid tests, the highest figure since April, while almost 2,800 people are in intensive care with the illness.
Professor Adam Finn, from the University of Bristol and a member of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), told BBC Breakfast the wave of Omicron was just taking off across the country.
He said: "The wave is coming very fast and in fact alarmingly fast - if anything faster than ever. So it really is a race at the moment.
"The more immunity that we've all got the less of a problem this is going to be but I'm afraid it is going to be a serious problem either way."
He said boosters took effect quickly, adding: "It does come through very fast because you've got immunological memory, you've seen the antigen before from your previous doses, so the level of protection goes up pretty quick.
"We generally look for the level of protection around two weeks, because that's probably when you get to pretty much maximum levels, but already at a week your antibody levels will be much higher than they were before you had the booster. So it does get going pretty quick."
Covid hospital admissions could reach 2,000 a day, an expert has warned.
Graham Medley, professor of infectious disease modelling at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "Most of the infections at the moment are in young adults, so these are people who are far less likely to need hospital treatment in any case.
"But in the past, in previous waves, we've seen that move out into more older and more vulnerable generations and there's no reason to suspect that won't happen during this wave.
"And then the numbers of people who end up in hospital is some combination of when people get infected, their vaccination status, as well as what omicron is doing.
"I think it is a very real possibility that if the numbers of infections increasing continues in the way that it has done and it spills out into older age groups than we could see the number of people being omitted to hospital getting very large and certainly going over the thousand, maybe up to 2,000 a day."
Covid infections are now at the level seen at the start of the year and are set to go "beyond that" in the coming months, an expert has said.
Graham Medley, professor of infectious disease modelling at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told BBC Radio 4's Today Programme: "The numbers of infections with omicron is increasing and has been increasing quite dramatically.
"We're probably now at the level that we have been in the past, back in January, and it does look as though it's going to continue beyond that and go over it."
He added: "We are a population in a very different position to this time last year in the sense that the majority of people have been vaccinated and there has been much infection since then.
"There is much more immunity so people ending up in hospital is a combination of both the virus and their immune response and the fact we are much more immune than we were, generally, means the virus will appear to be much less severe.
"So individually, we have a much lower risk but the numbers of infections means that even though individually we are at less risk, at population level, the number of people ending up in hospital could get very large."
Professor Adam Finn told BBC Breakfast it was not up to him to say what regulations should be put on the population, but he added: "I think I can certainly encourage people to do everything they can to minimise spread of the virus during this critical period and, of course, a lot of that can be done voluntarily without anyone imposing rules on people.
"We all know now what the things are that we can do. We can avoid social contact, we can minimise contact at work, we can wear masks and really importantly, do lateral flow tests and check that you aren't showing signs of infection on a test before you go into a crowded place where you might infect other people."
Prof Finn said he was "very concerned" about the current number of daily infections, adding that omicron "is a big step change upwards in terms of transmissibility - in other words, it's much easier to get infected, or to infect other people."
He added that we are "going to see the numbers of people becoming ill and needing hospital care beginning to rise steadily now over the next week and maybe over Christmas as well."
Covid cases in London are accelerating more than was seen the very first wave of the virus, a scientist has said.
Professor Tim Spector, who helped found the Covid Zoe app, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme the "majority of symptoms" of the omicron variant are like a common cold, including headaches, sore throat, runny nose, fatigue and sneezing.
He said: "In London, where Covid is increasing rapidly, its far more likely to be Covid than it is to be a cold.
"We're seeing doubling in the numbers equivalent to what's being seen elsewhere, every two-and-a-half days, and that really means numbers are going up.
"If we look at our regional charts we see London accelerating more than we've seen it since the very first wave and this now means that omicron is the predominant variant already.
"We'll be at 100 per cent very soon, so that's happened in just a matter of days - that's is why so many people are going down with infections."
Omicron is triggering a “rather different” set of symptoms compared to previous variants, experts have warned, including lower back pain and a scratchy throat.
An analysis of roughly 78,000 omicron cases in South Africa, published on Tuesday, found that the variant is resulting in milder disease compared to previous waves, with 29 per cent fewer hospitalisations than the Wuhan strain and 23 per cent fewer compared to delta.
Speaking at a briefing Ryan Noach – chief executive of Discovery Health, the country’s largest private health insurer, which was behind the study – said doctors have noted a slightly different set of symptoms among those testing positive.
The most common early sign was a scratchy throat, he said, followed by nasal congestion, a dry cough and myalgia manifesting in lower back pain.
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