Plans to Ease Covid Restrictions in England mentions an article on BBC.
- “rough winter for all sorts of reasons”, including a resurgence of flu
- self-isolation to reflect the changing situation as the country opens up more
- nearly 60% of UK adults have had two doses of the vaccine
To ease Covid restrictions
Plans to ease Covid restrictions in England on 19 July are “looking good”, the prime minister has said. Boris Johnson said that was based on the efficacy of vaccines against identified variants. But he warned there could be a “rough winter for all sorts of reasons”, including a resurgence of flu.
It comes as the health secretary said he hoped to exempt fully vaccinated people from the requirement to isolate for 10 days when contact-traced. Asked during a visit to a laboratory in Hertfordshire whether he could rule out further lockdowns this winter, Mr. Johnson said: “You can never exclude that there will be some new disease, some new horror that we simply haven’t budgeted for, or accounted for.
“But looking at where we are, looking at the efficacy of the vaccines against all variants that we can currently see – so Alpha, Delta, the lot of them, Kappa – I think it’s looking good for 19 July to be that terminus point.”
Mr. Johnson said the risk of a “rough winter” was “all the more reason to reduce the number of Covid cases now, give the NHS the breathing space it needs to get on with dealing with all those other pressures, and we are certainly going to be putting in the investment to make sure that they can”.
Self-isolation to reduce the spread
Meanwhile, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said that he hoped to bring in a new approach to self-isolation to reflect the changing situation as the country opens up more and more.
For the past two months, a pilot study has been underway in which 40,000 people who have been named as contacts of someone who has tested positive for Covid have been allowed to take daily Covid tests and continue with their lives, rather than having to self-isolate.
“We’re piloting that now to check that will be effective and it is something that we’re working on,” the health secretary said. “We’re not ready to be able to take that step yet. But it’s something that I want to see and we will introduce, subject to clinical advice, as soon as it’s reasonable to do so.”
The trial is not expected to be completed until later in the summer. Currently, anybody who has been told by NHS Test and Trace that they are a contact of somebody who has tested positive for the virus must self-isolate for 10 days.
This means not leaving home at all – even to buy food or medicines, or for exercise. The rule applies to people regardless of whether they have received a coronavirus jab. So far, nearly 60% of UK adults have had two doses of the vaccine, meaning they are fully vaccinated, and more than four in five adults have had their first dose.
Vaccination open for 18+
The prime minister said the government was also looking at using daily tests for travelers. Asked whether ministers were considering allowing double-vaccinated travelers to be exempt from quarantine on their return to the UK if they took daily tests, Mr. Johnson told reporters: “When it comes to travel, we’ll certainly be looking at that.
“But I want to stress this is going to be, whatever happens, a difficult year for travel – there will be a hassle, there will be delays, I’m afraid because the priority has got to be to keep the country safe and to stop the virus coming back in.”
Currently, people arriving in the UK from a country on the government’s amber list must quarantine for 10 days – regardless of whether they have had a coronavirus jab.
However, in England, an individual may be able to end their quarantine period early if they pay for an additional test under the test-to-release scheme.
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Source: BBC
