Staff sickness levels among Norfolk’s mental health carers were some 24pc higher than target, as the Omicron variant of Covid continues to cause “unprecedented pressure” across the county’s health and care system.

Newly released data from the Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust (NSFT), which provides the counties’ mental health and learning disability care, reveals that staff sickness levels across the organisation were at 6.5pc on Thursday, of which about a third was related to Covid.

The usual trust target is for no more than 4.91pc to be off sick.

Public sector workplaces across the UK were this week asked by the government to prepare for worst case scenarios of 10pc, 20pc and 25pc absence rates, linked to Covid.

The county's health and care system - like others across the country - is struggling this winter with a higher than usual number of people requiring ambulance services and urgent care.

There are also challenges with discharging patients who are well enough to leave hospital, while rising staff sickness has worsened the workload.

The pressure culminated this week when the Norfolk and Waveney Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) declared a “critical incident”.

The NSFT has said large numbers of very unwell people are still presenting in need of mental health support, and that staff have been redeployed where necessary to support inpatient wards and urgent care services.

The trust is also recruiting a 'peripatetic' team to help cover staff absences on inpatient wards and in community mental health teams.

A peripatetic team works to provide short-term support in the areas that need it most at any given time.

Amy Eagle, interim chief operating officer at the NSFT said: “Health and care services, including NSFT, are under unprecedented pressure and we are working closely with our system partners and colleagues to keep services running.

“Our teams continue to work exceptionally hard; and we would like to reassure our service users and the public that despite the challenges, mental health services remain open for anyone who needs them.

“We want to thank all our staff for going above and beyond to provide the best possible care for people during an extremely difficult and demanding time for the NHS”.