Many personalities are among the new "positives": from the King of Sweden Carl XVI Gustaf and his wife Queen Silvia, to the Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani and his Botswana counterpart Mokgweetsi Masisi, through the goalkeeper of Paris SG Gianluigi Donnarumma and footballers Lucas Hernandez and Tanguy Nianzou from Bayern Munich, where no less than eight players are affected.

Faced with a worrying fifth wave, the United States has recorded a world record of more than a million cases in 24 hours, according to data from Johns Hopkins University stopped Monday evening.

This figure should however be taken with caution because the number of cases recorded on Monday is generally very high, especially after a three-day weekend as was the case with the New Year in the United States.

However, this is more than double the cases recorded last Monday, after the three-day Christmas weekend.

A record also in Australia, with nearly 50,000 daily cases, causing a scramble for drug tests despite their cost.

"Fear of heights"

The "positivity rate", or the proportion of cases in people tested, now exceeds 15% in the country, close to its records of fall 2020.

The United Kingdom on Tuesday recorded a new record of more than 200,000 cases in 24 hours.

The current wave of the epidemic, relaunched at the end of 2021 by the arrival of the Omicron variant, considerably more contagious than the previous ones even if its severity seems limited, is leading to an increase in absences for illness.

A phenomenon which causes dysfunctions in several sectors, in particular that of health.

At least six hospitals in the United Kingdom declared “critical incidents” on Tuesday, meaning that the situation could affect priority care.

The lack of staff was also affecting the start of the school year in England, where the government renewed its call for retired teachers to come in as reinforcements.

Faced with the Omicron tidal wave, governments have imposed new restrictions, including encouraging teleworking, while putting pressure on the unvaccinated.

In France, the government wants to institute a vaccination pass instead of the sanitary pass: under a text whose examination had a hiccup overnight due to a blockage of the opposition, but which should logically be adopted in the coming days, the unvaccinated will no longer have access to leisure activities or to restaurants and bars.

Cyprus, for its part, could announce new measures on Wednesday, such as restrictions on nightclubs, places of entertainment and home visits, while the island has the highest rate of contamination in the world (2,505 cases for 100,000 inhabitants).

The Indian capital New Delhi has also imposed new measures, including confinement during weekends.

Cruises affected

The Philippines will also extend restrictions to areas around the capital Manila, with some 25 million people affected: the unvaccinated will have to stay at home for the duration of the restrictions - in effect until mid-January - and will only be able to go out to buy basic necessities or exercise.

Man receives third dose of Covid-19 vaccine in Espoo, Finland, January 4, 2022 Jussi Nukari Lehtikuva / AFP

China has for its part confined more than a million additional inhabitants in a locality in the center of the country after the discovery of three asymptomatic cases, one month before the Beijing Winter Olympics.

The epidemic is beginning to affect the cruise industry again.

The Brazilian Association announced on Monday the suspension of sea cruises until January 21, due to "differences" on the application of the Covid protocols, after the appearance of clusters on three ships.

Nearly 3,000 passengers, mostly German, were also disembarked Monday in Lisbon after several cases of Covid-19 on board.

Fashion is not spared.

Italian designer Giorgio Armani has announced the cancellation of his parades scheduled for January during Milan Fashion Week and Paris Haute Couture Week, due to the increase in Covid cases.

The extreme contagiousness of the Omicron variant is not, for the time being, accompanied by a significant increase in deaths.

Since the discovery of the virus in December 2019, the pandemic has killed more than 5.4 million people, according to an AFP count.

© 2022 AFP