as you've been hearing, the uk, france and the united states have all registered new coronavirus records as the omicron variant continues to spread rapidly around the world. the uk recorded nearly 219,000 new infections in the latest 24—hour period, the highest daily figure so far. prime minister borisjohnson said that despite the huge increase in covid cases there is a "substantial" level of immunity in the population. but the weeks ahead are going to be "challenging" and some services will be disrupted due to staff absences. in order to combat this, around 100,000 critical workers in the uk are set to take daily covid tests from january 10 in order to reduce the spread of the virus to colleagues — it will be for key industries including food processing, transport and the border force. but business leaders had been