[ad_1]
A SECOND LOCKDOWN has been announced in England and all non-essential activities will cease from Thursday.
Nonessential pubs, restaurants and shops will have to close until December 2 under tough new measures unveiled by the government today.
There will also be a nationwide ban on home visits. Individual exercise with a person from another household is allowed.
As in Ireland, schools and tertiary institutes will remain open. Construction, manufacturing and court service work will also continue.
People will be asked to stay home except for essential work, education, and grocery shopping.
Hair salons, leisure centers and entertainment venues will also close next week.
The new restrictions were announced by Prime Minister Boris Johnson in Downing Street tonight in an effort to stem the second wave of Covid-19 in the country.
“Now is the time to act because there is no alternative,” Johnson said. “We have to be humiliated in front of nature.”
Johnson also said there should be no mixing of households, although support bubbles are allowed for single-adult households.
Apologizing to the companies, Johnson also said the government will extend license payments by 80% for the duration of the new national lockdown measures in England.
Under the new restrictions, elite sport will continue, but there will be a ban on amateur sport.
The press conference came after new data showed the extent of the cases in England. The Office for National Statistics estimated that 568,100 people in households were infected with coronavirus in the week ending October 23.
And, today, the UK also surpassed one million laboratory-confirmed cases of Covid-19.
Figures released today showed an additional 21,915 laboratory-confirmed cases were reported as of 9 a.m., meaning the total is now 1,011,660. However, the exact number of infections in the UK is believed to be much higher due to a lack of widespread testing during the onset of the pandemic.
The UK has also recorded 46,555 Covid-19 related deaths.
“No responsible prime minister can ignore the message of those figures,” Johnson said tonight.
The Prime Minister and his team had been insisting until yesterday that their three-tier system was the best approach to tackle the second wave while avoiding the financial damage of a total circuit disruption. He said a second lockdown would be “disastrous” for the economy.
However, members of the Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) supported the introduction of stricter measures.
Professor Sir Jeremy Farrar said the consequences of sticking to the current “insufficient” restrictions would be “much worse” than opting for a second lockdown.
The Wellcome Trust director said: “The sooner we act, the sooner we can start to recover. It will be a very difficult few weeks now and no one can underestimate the price that will be charged to people.
Professor Calum Semple, a member of Sage, told BBC Radio 4’s Today program: “For critics who don’t believe in a second wave, there is a second wave.
“And, unlike the first wave, where we had a national blockade that protected large sectors of society, this outbreak is now spreading to all age groups.”
No news is bad news
Support the magazine
your contributions help us continue to deliver the stories that are important to you
Support us now
Professor John Edmunds said the only way to have a “relatively safe” Christmas is to take “strict” steps now to reduce the incidence of the virus “immediately.”
It comes after a senior government science advisor said “it’s definitely too late to think that the two-week circuit breaker alone will fix this.”
“It would lower it a bit, but it wouldn’t be enough to lower (the R-value). A two-week breaker would have an effect, but now it almost certainly would need to continue longer to have a significant effect. “
North Ireland
Tonight, Northern Ireland Prime Minister Arlene Foster confirmed that there will be no change to restrictions in the north, and that schools will reopen on Monday.
Foster also said the restrictions will end, as scheduled, on November 13.
“We must adapt to live with the virus. That means increasing the capacity of the hospital and testing. ” Foster tweeted.
Previously, 649 new cases of Covid-19 were confirmed in Northern Ireland.
With PA reports
[ad_2]