The risk of new variants developing recently increased significantly when the government lifted the remaining Covid-19 restrictions including the legal requirement to self-isolate if a person tests positive for the virus.
Furthermore, from the first of April free-testing will end in the UK.
As a result of restrictions lifting, a decision criticised by doctors and scientists alike due to the lack of evidence presented by the government, the worry is that a new variant will develop that has a greater degree of vaccine escape than Omicron.
When Omicron spread rapidly through the country at the end of 2021, it was found two doses of the vaccine were not enough to protect people from serious illness.