Here are the main points from the press conference. It was dominated by Prof Chris Whitty, England’s chief medical officer, whose public health advice went way beyond what No 10 has been saying in recent days. Boris Johnson did not fully endorse his comments, but he made little effort to contradict his adviser either. It probably suits No 10 for people to hear warnings that cause them to reduce their social mixing over the coming weeks. Critics of the approach call it “lockdown by stealth”. Whitty said that people would be getting infected with the Omicron variant of coronavirus in “very, very, very large numbers” quite soon. It was spreading at “an absolutely phenomenal pace”, he said. He said: This is a really serious threat at the moment. How big a threat? There are several things we don’t know. But all the things that we do know are bad and the principal one being the speed at which this is moving, it is moving at an absolutely phenomenal pace. Therefore between the time that it first starts to really take off in a way people will be able to see and the point when we get to very, very, very large numbers will be quite a short one, and that, I think, is part of the issue in trying to deal with this. Referring to today’s figures showing recorded Covid cases at a record level (see 4.11pm), he said: I’m afraid we have to be realistic that records will be broken a lot over the next few weeks as the rates continue to go up. He said the UK has two epidemics running one on top of the other. He said: What we’ve got is two epidemics on top of one another – an existing Delta epidemic, roughly flat, and a very rapidly growing Omicron epidemic on top of it. He said he was fairly certain Omicron would lead to a large increase in the number of people going to hospital. He said: I am afraid there will be an increasing number of Omicron patients going into the NHS, going into hospital, going into intensive cares, and exact ratios we don’t yet know but there will be substantial numbers. That will begin to become apparent, in my view, fairly soon after Christmas. It’ll start before then but in terms of the big numbers, I think that’s a reasonably, I’m afraid, a reasonably nailed-on prospect. But he did not put figures on how high hospital cases might rise, or how many people were likely to die, stressing that there was still not enough data available to predict exactly what the impact would be in the UK. He said that the NHS would be hit by serious staff shortages after Christmas because of people contracting Omicron over the holidays. Talking about the health service in particular, he said: We may end up with quite substantial gaps in rotas at short notice. Given how much difficulty my health and social care colleagues have had over the last two years, saying that is pretty depressing, because they have really, really had to stand up and go back again and again. The reality is this speed of onset is going to lead to lots of people getting ill simultaneously and we have to be realistic about that. Whitty advised people to limit their socialising to people that “really matter”. Asked what people should do over Christmas, he said: I really think people should be prioritising those things, and only those things, that really matter to them. Because otherwise the risk of someone getting infected at something that doesn’t really matter to them, and then not being able to do the things that do matter to them, obviously goes up ... The point I’m making is, don’t mix with people you don’t have to ... [Focus on] things that really matter to you. This was in stark contrast to the message No 10 has been giving out in recent days, when it has been saying it does not want people to cancel parties. Boris Johnson was less gung-ho than he has been before about carrying on as normal. He said people should be cautious. But he would not go as far as echoing what Whitty said, in terms of urging people to restrict their contacts quite significantly, and he said “we’re not cancelling people’s parties”. Whitty said there should be “really serious caution” over reports that a reduction in hospitalisations was being seen in cases of Omicron in South Africa. He explained: The first caution on this is simply a numerical one - if the rate of hospitalisation were to halve but you’re doubling every two days, in two days you’re back to where you were before you actually had the hospitalisation. If the peak of this is twice as great, then halving of the size of the hospitalisation rate, you still end up in the same place. And this peak is going very fast. The second point I wanted to make, which I’m not sure it’s fully been absorbed by everybody, is that the amount of immunity in South Africa for this wave - because of a prior Delta wave and vaccination - is far higher than it was for their last wave. And therefore the fact that there is a lower hospitalisation rate is unsurprising. Whitty said people feel “angry” about “unfairness”, in an apparent dig at No 10 over partygate. Asked about it, he said: I think it’s a statement of fact that when people think there’s unfairness, and particularly if they think there’s unfairness in high places, they, of course, get angry. I’m not commenting on individual cases or commenting on the rights or wrongs of anything, to be honest, I never have throughout this and I don’t intend to start now. Johnson claimed he had always followed the rules. He claimed the partygate controversy had not stopped people following public health message from government. He said: If I may say so, I think that the public can readily ... as I think colleagues have said ... the public can readily distinguish between these types of reports and these types of accounts, and the overwhelming imperative that we have now together to tackle this disease in the two-pronged way that we are. I think those are the messages that I’m seeing the public understand very, very loud and clear, and really responding magnificently. That is all from me for today. But our Covid coverage continues on our global live blog. It’s here.