2020 2.0
Lockdown until AUTUMN possible as mutant Covid makes relaxing rules much harder, warns Prof Lockdown
BRITS could be in lockdown until autumn as the mutant Covid strain makes relaxing restrictions harder, Professor Lockdown has claimed.
Professor Neil Ferguson, whose modelling led to the first lockdown, said the UK needs the "highest vaccine coverage possible" before rules are loosened.
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Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today show, the senior epidemiologist today warned that "we need to be very cautious on how we relax restrictions".
Responding to whether lockdowns would be in place for months to come, he said the new variant, first discovered in the UK in September, would make the lifting of restrictions harder.
"We can't predict these things in advance," warned Prof Ferguson, who quit as a government adviser after breaking quarantine to see his lover.
"We couldn't have predicted this new variant coming up, but the new variant without doubt will make the relaxation of restrictions more difficult because it is substantially more transmissible.
"So it will be a gradual process to the autumn."
It comes after a Sunday Times interview in which he predicted the UK would be "back to normal by September" - as the vaccine will give Brits herd immunity.
CAREFUL LIFTING
Speaking today he warned that any lifting of restrictions would come down to how many people have been vaccinated.
"We have to be very careful, bear in mind that probably at a national level only about 20 per cent of the population has been infected so far, probably a bit higher in London and yet we have had effectively 100,000 deaths resulting from 20 per cent of the population being infected," he said.
"We have to get to very high levels of vaccine coverage in those vulnerable groups before we can reduce that risk of having the same number of deaths again."
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Prof Ferguson, director of the centre for infectious global disease analysis at Imperial College London, highlighted that if we only get 70 per cent of vaccine coverage in the elderly, then that still leaves 30 per cent unprotected, plus the rest of the population.
He added: "We could get a very large epidemic which unfortunately could kill many people.
"What the modelling and all the analysis feeding in from all the different groups to Sage says is that we need to be very cautious on how we relax restrictions and try to ensure we get the highest vaccine coverage as possible."
However, he offered some hope as he suggested some parts of England are showing a plateau in Covid cases, while the growth rate across the country as a whole is slowing.
He said: "I think it's much too early to say exactly when case numbers are going to start coming down, but in some NHS regions in England and in Wales there's sign of plateauing."
London in particular was seeing a drop in its number of positive coronavirus tests, alongside the South East, he said.
"At the moment, it looks like in London in particular, and a couple of other regions - the South East and east of England - (that) hospital admissions may even have plateaued, though it's hard to tell they're coming down.
In some NHS regions in England and in Wales there's sign of plateauing
Professor Neil Ferguson
"It has to be said this is not being seen everywhere.
"Both case numbers and hospital admissions are going up in many other areas but, overall, at a national level we're seeing the rate of growth slow."
said he would expect to see case numbers "continue to come down slowly at a national level" but with regional variations.
"It will take longer though for hospital admissions - daily admissions - to start coming down and even longer for hospital bed occupancy to come down," he said.
Asked how many more weeks of rising hospital admissions and deaths the UK could be looking at, he said: "It critically depends on whether the lockdown we're in the moment will actually control growth in all areas.
"But I would hope that hospital admissions might plateau, instead of keep going up, some time in the next week.
"Hospital bed occupancy may continue to rise slowly for up to two weeks and deaths maybe even for longer.
"We're going to be well over 1,000 deaths a day, even measured by the date people die rather than the date deaths are reported, before numbers start coming down."
Prof Ferguson said the total number of deaths in the UK "unfortunately is going to be well over 100,000, there's nothing we can do about that now".
He suggested that the requirement to isolate after coming into contact with a person with coronavirus could be relaxed for people who have recently had the virus, such as NHS workers, but said this was "a question for policymakers".
PHARMACY ROLL OUT
His comments came as some large high street pharmacies, including Boots and Superdrug, began rolling out Covid vaccines.
Six stores across England can administer the jabs from Thursday as the Government aims to hit its target of vaccinating around 15 million of those most at risk by mid-February.
People who are eligible for a vaccine will be contacted and invited to make an appointment through a new national booking service.
This gives them the option of having the vaccine at a pharmacy or in a GP-led vaccination centre.
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While there is no end date set for the current lockdown, the Government hopes to have vaccinated 13million vulnerable Brits by mid-February.
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Boris Johnson has warned even if that target is reached, it will take weeks before restrictions could start to ease.
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