our health editor hugh pym is here. how worried are the authorities? welcome of the original omicron strain, known as ba one, is still dominant but in recent weeks a new one which has been named as ba two has been identified and officials say based on 1000 cases in england so far there is a faster growth rate and are currently substantial growth advantage, although from very low level of cases in its early days. they say there is higher transmission in households, a little bit, anyway, so you are more likely to pass it on to someone under the same roof. but there is no evidence that vaccines are less effective against it and no evidence that it causes more severe illness in terms of getting people into hospital, but it will be watched very closely. in denmark more than 50% of cases involve this strand. officials of the uk are saying given the relatively high overall number of cases people should continue to act cautiously. one virus expert has
seeing less infection, less severe disease, because of immunity from vaccines and prior infections, as well, provide good protection against the disease. the fly in the ointment, of course, is ba2, this is a variant of omicron and there has been recent data from japan suggesting this is not actually intrinsically less brilliant than some of the ancestral variance of covid. dallas macro lese reland. we are still looking at that but we should not expect to see substantially more severe disease even with ba two. substantially more severe disease even with ba two. professor, thank ou. our health correspondent jim reed is with me now. we have heard from buckingham palace of the statement that the queen has tested positive. experiencing mild