Monday, February 15, 2021
Almost all 70 year olds vaccinated
Johnson wants to loosen "irreversibly"
In the course of the Corona crisis, the British Prime Minister has to take a lot of criticism. All the louder are the tones with which Johnson is now praising the success of the vaccination campaign in the Kingdom. The success is a "national" one and the easing that awaits on the island "irreversible".
According to Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the British government is seeking "cautious but irreversible" relaxation of the corona lockdown. Johnson said during a visit to a health center in London that the government would be "very careful" with the easing in order to avoid a new lockdown. The government and the people of the country expected "progress that is cautious but irreversible".
At the same time, the British vaccination campaign is going better than in any other European country. The United Kingdom reached an important interim goal on Sunday: 15 million of its 66 million inhabitants have already received a vaccine dose. According to the government, this is 90 percent of the over 70s. That is a "singular national achievement," said Johnson. At the same time, the prime minister warned that "the danger remains very real". More people with Covid-19 are still being treated in British hospitals than during the first corona wave in April. By the end of April, the British want to have given all over 50-year-olds a first dose of vaccine.
With over four million infected people and more than 117,000 dead, Great Britain is the country hardest hit by the corona pandemic in Europe. At the beginning of January, the government in London again imposed a lockdown with school closings, which will apply until March 8. She was responding to a dramatic increase in the number of infections, which was attributed to the spread of a more contagious variant of the coronavirus.
Health Minister asks for patience
Since then, the number of new infections has fallen sharply. As a result, calls for the restrictions to be relaxed in March have recently become louder. Over the weekend, more than 60 MPs from the ruling Tories signed a letter demanding a clear schedule from Johnson for easing and lifting all legislative measures by the end of April. It is now expected that the government will present a timetable for easing in England next Monday – the regional governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are responsible for the corona measures in the other parts of the country. Schools in England could reopen on March 8th.
However, Health Secretary Matt Hancock asked people to be patient. The country is still a long way from easing the lockdown, he said. According to him, the government is still waiting for data on the effect of vaccines on the transferability of the virus. Since Monday, a ten-day hotel quarantine has been in effect for returnees from 33 high-risk countries where the new coronavirus variants are widespread.
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