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The COVID-19 restrictions are likely to be in effect until Easter, Sky News learned, as Boris Johnson heads for a Commons showdown with rebel Tory MPs over the new levels.
High-level sources have revealed that even if a large number of COVID-19 Vaccinations start at the end of January, it will be Easter, April 4 next year, before life returns to normal.
The stern warning, delivered to the prime minister and senior ministers by government scientific advisers, contrasts with the more optimistic forecasts of Mr johnson In recent days.
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New warning from government scientists for Christmas
The grim prediction coincides with a government counterattack by the Cabinet Office minister. Michael Gove against Rebel conservative MPs threatening vote against the new levels on Tuesday.
Writing in The Times, Gove says that every hospital in England is facing an overwhelming number of COVID-19 cases if MPs do not back the government’s tough new voting restrictions.
Warning that it could be Easter before coronavirus restrictions are lifted, a source familiar with the government’s scientific council told Sky News: “This has been the current assumption.
“If you think vaccines will start arriving in large numbers at the end of January, it will be Easter when life changes appropriately and there will be restrictions until then.
“The government has also made it very clear that the restrictions will extend into January and beyond.”
Earlier, during a visit to the Porton Down research laboratory near Salisbury, the prime minister raised the possibility of local authorities moving to lower levels in the review scheduled for December 16.
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But the government’s scientific advisers have stressed that this is unlikely, particularly before Christmas, a warning that is likely to mislead many Conservative MPs ahead of next week’s vote.
Higher Conservative MPs predict a rebellion of up to 70 Conservative MPs, which would mean that the prime minister would have to rely on Labor votes to avoid a humiliating defeat.
In other developments:
- More than 1,300 people were wrongly told they had coronavirus due to laboratory error with NHS Test and Trace
- The relaxation of coronavirus restrictions at Christmas will increase infections “potentially in large numbers,” government scientific advisers have warned.
- A COVID-19 vaccine could be available in hospitals in England in just 10 days, it has been reported.
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PM: Normal is coming, but not until spring
Writing in The Times, Gove revealed that the decision to impose a four-week lockdown earlier this month was made after scientists warned that lockdown rules weren’t enough to prevent the NHS from feeling “physically overwhelmed.” .
He wrote: “Every bed, every room occupied. All capacity built in the Nightingales and requisitioned from the private sector as well. The numbers infected with COVID-19 and requiring a bed would displace all but emergencies. And even those.
Mr Gove said that MPs should not fall into “comfortable evasions” that things were different now or put their constituents ahead of the national interest.
“When the country faces a national crisis of this kind, the truth is that all of us who have been elected to parliament, not just ministers, must take responsibility for difficult decisions.
“COVID-19 does not respect electoral district boundaries and the hardships we now face are sadly necessary to protect each and every one of us, no matter where we live.”
Gove described the new restrictions that will see the vast majority of England at stricter levels as “grim, inevitably necessary” to prevent the NHS from being able to treat emergency patients.
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Dozens of MPs are likely to rebel before the vote
“The level of infection throughout the country remains uncontrollable and threateningly high,” he said. “Across the UK, around 16,000 beds are filled with COVID-19 patients, compared to nearly 20,000 at the April peak.
“From the current high base, any sharp increase in infection could put the NHS back under even more serious threat.”
Gove also rejected suggestions that the measures were economically damaging, arguing that without them “the economy would come to a halt” as a terrified population stays home rather than risking being left unattended.
He also accepted that the previous levels “were not strong enough to reduce social contact enough, nor were they applied widely enough to contain the spread of the virus … and that is the difficult lesson that we cannot unlearn when this is over blocking”.
