LONDON (AP) – Children in England will return to school and people will be able to meet a friend outside for coffee in two weeks, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced on Monday, while presenting a slow reduction of one of the most rigid pandemic blocks in Europe.
But those who crave a haircut, a restaurant meal or a beer in a pub have almost two months of waiting, and people won’t be able to hug loved ones they don’t live with until at least.
Johnson said the government’s plan it would move the country “cautiously, but irreversibly” out of the blockade.
“We are moving towards what I hope will be a one-way road to freedom,” he told lawmakers in the House of Commons.
Britain had the most deadly coronavirus outbreak in Europe, with more than 120,000 deaths. Faced with a dominant variant of the virus that scientists say is more transmissible and more deadly than the original virus, the country has spent much of the winter under a severe block – the third since March 2020. Bars, restaurants, gyms, schools, hairdressers and non-essential stores are closed, people are encouraged not to travel outside their local area and holidays abroad are illegal.
This will start to change, little by little, on March 8, when the children return to school and people can find a friend or relative for a chat or an outdoor picnic. Three weeks later, people will be able to gather in small groups outdoors to play sports or relax.
According to the government plan, stores and hairdressers will reopen on April 12. The same will happen with bars and restaurants, although only outdoors. Indoor spaces, such as theaters and cinemas, and indoor spaces in bars and restaurants, are scheduled to open on May 17, and limited crowds will be able to return to the sports stadiums. It is also the first date on which the British can take a holiday abroad.
The final phase of the plan, in which all legal limits to social contact are removed and clubs can reopen 15 months after closing, is scheduled for June 21.
The government says the dates may be postponed if infections increase.
The announced measures apply to England. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have slightly different blocks in place, with some children returning to school in Scotland and Wales on Monday.
Hopes for a return to normality largely depend on Britain’s rapid inoculation program, which gave more than 17.5 million people, a third of the country’s adult population, the first of two doses of the vaccine. The government’s goal is to give each adult an injection of vaccine by July 31.
Johnson said vaccines would help Britain leave a “terrible year” behind.
But the government warns that the resumption of social and economic life in the country will be slow. Johnson’s conservative government was accused of reopening the country very quickly after the first blockade in the spring and of rejecting scientific advice before a short “breaker” blockage in the autumn.
He doesn’t want to make the same mistakes again, although Johnson is under pressure from some conservative lawmakers and business owners, who argue that restrictions must be lifted quickly to revive the shaky economy.
The conservative government – in normal times an opponent of lavish public spending – spent £ 280 billion ($ 393 billion) in 2020 to deal with the pandemic, including billions paying the wages of nearly 10 million licensed workers.
British Chamber of Commerce Director-General Adam Marshall praised the “clarity” about the reopening dates, but said “the future of thousands of companies and millions of jobs is still at stake”.
Johnson said the government’s annual budget statement on March 3 would contain new measures “to protect jobs and livelihoods across the UK”
The government says that further easing will depend on vaccines proven to be effective in reducing hospitalizations and deaths, infection rates remaining low and no new virus variants emerging that stand in the way of plans.
Two UK studies released on Monday showed that COVID-19 vaccination programs are contributing to a sharp drop in illness and hospitalization, raising hopes that vaccines will work just as well in the real world as they did in carefully controlled studies.
Preliminary results from a study in Scotland found that the Pfizer vaccine reduced hospitalizations by up to 85% four weeks after the first dose, while the AstraZeneca injection reduced hospitalizations by up to 94%. In England, preliminary data from a study with healthcare professionals showed that the Pfizer vaccine reduced the risk of contracting COVID-19 by 70% after one dose, which increased to 85% after the second.
The scientists stressed that the results are preliminary.
Johnson said that even with vaccines, the reopening of society would inevitably lead to more infections and deaths.
He said there is “no reliable route to a zero-COVID Britain, or even, a zero-COVID world”.
But, he added, “we cannot persist indefinitely with restrictions that weaken our economy, our physical and mental well-being and our children’s chances of life.”
___
Follow all the PA’s pandemic coverage at:
https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic
https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine
https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak