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MPs have backed a new four-week coronavirus lockdown for England, after Boris Johnson warned of an “existential threat” to the NHS without taking action to slow the spread of the disease.
Starting tomorrow, nonessential pubs, restaurants and shops will again be forced to close their doors after the Commons voted 516 to 38, a government majority of 478, in favor of the new restrictions.
The move came as the NHS in England was ready to move to its highest alert level, Level 4, since midnight amid a continued increase in coronavirus patients needing hospital care.
NHS England Chief Executive Sir Simon Stevens said the service already had “the value of 22 hospitals” of Covid-19 patients and now faced a “serious situation ahead”.
With Labor Party support for the new lockdown restrictions, which were also expected to be passed by the House of Lords later today, the majority of the government was never in doubt.
However, Johnson faced a backlash from some Conservative MPs, led by former Prime Minister Theresa May, alarmed by the economic impact of the controls, as well as the restriction of civil liberties.
In the House of Commons, Johnson tried to reassure deputies by telling them that the measures, which expire on December 2, should allow stores and businesses to reopen in time for the run-up to Christmas.
However, he acknowledged that it would depend on getting the R number, the virus’s reproduction rate, below 1.
The new restrictions come as the government said 492 more people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of today.
This brings the UK total to 47,742.
The number of deaths reported today is the highest daily figure since May 19, when 500 deaths were reported.
Separate figures released by UK statistical agencies for deaths where Covid-19 has been mentioned on the death certificate, along with additional data on deaths that have occurred in recent days, show that there have now been around than 63,000 Covid-19-related deaths in the UK. .
The government said that, as of 9 a.m. today, another 25,177 laboratory-confirmed coronavirus cases had been recorded in the UK.
It brings the total number of cases in the UK to 1,099,059.
In Northern Ireland, there have been ten more deaths related to Covid-19 and 679 new cases of the virus.
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Meanwhile, northwest police chiefs have warned that they will harshly attack anyone they believe can “circumvent” the restrictions.
In a joint open letter, the police chiefs of Greater Manchester, Merseyside, Lancashire, Cheshire and Cumbria said they would particularly target those who host music events or other large gatherings, and those who refuse to isolate themselves.
“For the minority who feel the restrictions do not apply to them, be prepared to face the consequences of higher levels of enforcement,” they said.
The latest restrictions come amid conflicting data on the current spread of the virus, with the Covid Symptom Tracker app, run by King’s College London (KCL), suggesting a slight drop in new infections in England, Wales and Scotland.
Professor Tim Spector, who led the study, said it showed “a plateau and a slight drop in new cases,” with an R number of 1.0.
However, data from the MRC Biostatistics Unit at the University of Cambridge puts the R number above one in most regions, with an estimated 77,600 new infections per day in England.
He predicted that by mid-November, the number of daily deaths would likely be between 380 and 710.
The latest government figures showed that another 397 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Tuesday, bringing the UK total to 47,250, while there were another 20,018 laboratory-confirmed cases. of the illness.
Ministers hope that when the restrictions are lifted, the government will be able to revert to a tiered series of localized restrictions for England, depending on the infection rate in a particular area.
However, Welsh Prime Minister Mark Drakeford said the closure will mean the toughest border between England and Wales for “at least several centuries”, and that travel between the two countries is prohibited without a reasonable excuse.
The controls will come into effect just as Wales prepares to end its two-and-a-half week “firebreak”, with schools, shops, pubs and restaurants reopening from Monday.
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