[ad_1]
The death toll in the United Kingdom from coronavirus was 26,711 on Thursday, but a slower rate of new infections and dwindling rate of deaths prompted Prime Minister Boris Johnson to declare that the country is past the peak.
Addressing the daily briefing for the first time after returning to office, Johnson, who had a brush with death after contracting the virus, said he was “very, very lucky” when he was admitted to the intensive care unit, but regretted that many people had lost their lives that.
He said: “Today the number of Covid hospital admissions is falling. The number of patients in ICU is falling. We have so far succeeded in the first and most important task we set ourselves as a nation. To avoid the tragedy that engulfed other parts of the world. Because at no stage has our NHS been overwhelmed. ”
Coronavirus outbreak: Full coverage
Five mega hospitals were quickly set up with help from the military, but after admissions slowed, the NHS was left with considerable capacity. Figures released on Friday said the number cases across settings in the UK were 171,253.
Johnson said: “And it is thanks to that massive collective effort to shield the NHS that we avoided an uncontrollable and catastrophic epidemic where the reasonable worst case scenario was 500,000 deaths. And so I can confirm today for the first time that we are past the peak of this disease. We are past the peak and we are on the downward slope ”.
Responding to growing demands that the government announce steps to exit the current lockdown, Johnson said he would set out a “comprehensive plan” next week, and highlighted ongoing efforts to develop a vaccine in the UK.
The University of Oxford and the biopharma major AstraZeneca on Friday announced a not-for-profit collaboration for large scale production and distribution if a vaccine produced by the former currently under human trials succeeds by September.
