Former head of vaccine taskforce says No 10 has not acted on his blueprint to prepare UK for new strainsCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverageBoris Johnson has been accused of ignoring a senior official’s plan to prepare Britain for the emergence of vaccine-resistant Covid variants, the Observer can reveal.With the government announcing on Saturday that the first UK cases...
Scientists have sprung into action to identify the new Covid variant. We don’t yet know if it is a major threat - but we should not take any chancesCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverageIt was only a matter of time before a new Sars-CoV-2 variant of concern emerged, requiring an urgent global response. It would seem that the Omicron variant, identified by scientists...
Billions of dollars over budget and years late, the most expensive, complex telescope to be sent into space will launch next month. What will it learn?In a few weeks, the most ambitious, costly robot probe ever built, the £6.8bn James Webb space telescope, will be blasted into space on top of a giant European Ariane 5 rocket. The launch of the observatory – which has been plagued by decades of...
Analysis: the new coronavirus variant seems highly transmissible, but the big question is whether it causes severe disease. Either way, poorer nations will be hit hardestCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverageIn early August Gideon Schreiber and a team of virologists at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel began playing around with the spike protein of the Sars-CoV-2...
Australians attempting to return home from southern Africa will be allowed into the country, but ordered into mandatory hotel quarantineAustralia has suspended flights from nine southern African countries and closed its borders to any foreign nationals who have been to the region, amid concern about the emerging Covid-19 variant of concern, Omicron.The announcement, made by the federal health...