The UK’s vaccination advisory council is expected to announce its support for expanding the Covid booster scheme later this week.
So far, nine cases of the Omicron variety have been discovered in the United Kingdom, and Number 10 has devised a plan to contain it.
Cutting the time between doses and extending boosters to the under-40s, according to Prof Anthony Harnden, deputy head of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), would be “reasonable.”
Face mask regulations and isolation rules will be presented to Parliament later.
The JCVI only provides advice to the government, and the final decision on steps to tackle Covid is always made by politicians – however Prime Minister Boris Johnson has stated that he plans to wait for the committee’s recommendations.
Its recommendation will be announced at a Downing Street coronavirus briefing at 15:00 GMT.
Speaking at the briefing will be England’s deputy chief medical officer, Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, Prof Wei Shen Lim, chair of the JCVI and Dr June Raine, chief executive of the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
Meanwhile, an urgent meeting of health ministers from the G7 group of nations is taking place “to discuss the developments on Omicron”, the Department for Health said.
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Early evidence suggests the new Omicron variant – initially reported to the World Health Organization from South Africa on Wednesday – has a higher reinfection risk.
The Scottish government announced on Monday morning that six cases of the variant had been identified in Scotland, with four in Lanarkshire and two in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde area.
Some of the cases identified in Scotland have had no travel history and caught the virus variant in the community, Deputy First Minister John Swinney told BBC’s Good Morning Scotland.
The first UK cases – picked up from analysis of recent positive Covid tests from all around the country – were confirmed on Saturday in Essex and Nottingham.
The third case identified on Sunday came from a visitor who spent time in the Westminster area of London, although the person is no longer in the UK, the Health Security Agency said.
The agency said it was “very likely” more cases would be found in the coming days.