The UK has recorded more than 90,000 daily Covid cases as the Omicron surge continued.
A further 90,629 lab-confirmed coronavirus cases have been recorded in the UK as of 9am on Tuesday, the government said, lower than 91,743 a day earlier.
The government said a further 172 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19.
Despite warnings of the UK breaking infection records on a daily basis, the number of cases has not gone above 93,045 since the high was set on Friday.
Testing data, however, typically lags over the weekend so it may more days for a true pattern to emerge.
It comes as Rishi Sunak offered a £1 billion support package to businesses hit by Covid restrictions amid concerns over the “eye-wateringly high” transmission of the Omicron variant.
The Chancellor has come forward with additional help for the hospitality and leisure sectors in England following days of urgent lobbying from MPs, firms and industry officials.
It includes one-off grants of up to £6,000 per premises for businesses in the affected sectors in England, which the Treasury expects will be administered by local authorities and to be available in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, NHS England urged people to get their booster vaccines, adding that a third of all slots this week are still available.
And Sir Jeremy Farrar, director of the global charitable foundation Wellcome, warned “we’re in the most difficult, most uncertain time, perhaps of the whole pandemic, certainly since March of 2020”.
Paul Hunter, Professor in Medicine at the University of East Anglia (UEA), also said the previous rapid increase in cases appears to be slowing and, if that is true, there is no need for a lockdown.
