Record numbers admitted to US hospitals with coronavirus; Sweden to introduce stricter curbs – as it happened

Over 132,000 patients currently on US wards with Covid; Swedish measures include work from home mandate

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Two of New Zealand's most prominent Covid-19 experts have warned that the country is unprepared to prevent the health system from being overloaded by an Omicron outbreak, with likely fatal consequences.

Otago University's Dr Nick Wilson and Dr Michael Baker also said it was only a matter of weeks" before the highly transmissible variant seeped into the community due to border failures.