Boris Johnson held an emergency Downing Street press conference on Saturday evening as two Omicron variant coronavirus cases were detected in the UK.

He told the nation that rules on face coverings and travel testing will be tightened, and that the vaccine booster programme will be “boosted”.

While Johnson also said he is “pretty confident” this Christmas will be considerably better than last, there are fears of the new variant spreading further than a case in Nottingham and a case in Essex.

Chief medical officer for England Chris Whitty added that the majority of cases in the UK remain to be of the Delta variant.

But these are rising, – with figures showing that there were 307,979 new cases in the last seven days.

This is an increase of 24,261 cases (8.6 per cent) on the week before.

Here we’ve also rounded up the latest coronavirus rates in south east London – and all of them are rising as well.

Bexley

158 new people had a confirmed positive coronavirus test result reported on November 27.

Between November 27 and the week before on November 21, 1,001 people had a confirmed positive test result.

This shows a 23.1 per cent increase.

Bromley

234 new people had a confirmed positive coronavirus test result reported on November 27.

Between November 27 and the week before on November 21, 1,529 people had a confirmed positive test result.

This shows a 26.1 per cent increase.

Greenwich

152 new people had a confirmed positive coronavirus test result reported on November 27.

Between November 27 and the week before on November 21, 928 people had a confirmed positive test result.

This shows a 26.9 per cent increase.

Lewisham

142 new people had a confirmed positive coronavirus test result reported on November 27.

Between November 27 and the week before on November 21, 1,036 people had a confirmed positive test result.

This shows a 35.2 per cent increase.

Southwark

164 new people had a confirmed positive coronavirus test result reported on November 27.

Between November 27 and the week before on November 21, 983 people had a confirmed positive test result.

This shows a 40.8 per cent increase.

Dartford

69 new people had a confirmed positive coronavirus test result reported on November 27.

Between November 27 and the week before on November 21, 500 people had a confirmed positive test result.

This shows a 32.3 per cent increase.

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