Another Beautiful Day

It's been another warm and sunny day. I mainly chilled today, but did pop into town to get my usual antihistamine (the other one made me far too sleepy). I've never had hayfever this early before or had such strong symptoms. After a bit of reading in the garden, I planted some salad onions and lettuce in the raised bed and covered it with netting to keep the birds off. I also planted some tomato seeds. The female blue tit that's building a nest in my camera nest box is the one in my blip photo. She's doing the last part of the nest building and bringing in soft feathers. 

Day 739 / Day 30 of no Legal Covid Requirements in England (for my record only)
The ONS weekly infection survey of private households to 19th Mar shows c1m more infections than the previous week, up nearly 30%. At an estimated 4.26m it's only just short of the highest ever recorded (4.3m) in the first week of 2022, and has 1 in 15 in the UK with the virus. In England, an estimated 1 in 15 had Covid (up); with 1 in 11 in Scotland (up and new record); 1 in 16 in Wales (up); and 1 in 17 in NI (down). Cases have now risen in Scotland for 8 weeks in a row. The sharp rise is due to the BA.2 variant per the ONS, which now accounts for nearly 9 in 10 cases - the UKHSA data implies that each BA.2 case leads to c75% more cases than BA.1. The R rate in Eng is unchanged at 1.1 to 1.4, but daily growth rate is up slightly to between 3% and 6%. The UKHSA data shows hospital admissions in the over 75s are higher than at the peak of the Omicron wave at the beginning of the year. Their data also shows that people aged 65 and over are 3 times more likely to need intensive care if they get infected with Omicron 15 weeks or more after their 3rd injection, but they are 86.8% less likely to need a ventilator than the unvaccinated. Surprising that the Spring booster is therefore only for over 75s and the immuno-compromised when a longer 6 months has passed since their last jab. Just under half of people in hospital with Covid in England are there because of the virus (although for the others, it doesn't mean the infection isn't relevant to their treatment).