The British government will review whether it needs to impose its strictest coronavirus restrictions on more of the country on Wednesday as a highly infectious variant continues to spread but will not change Christmas rules, a minister said.
Britain reported a record number of new infections on Tuesday as a mutated strain of the coronavirus, which could be up to 70% more transmissible than the original, causes the number of cases and hospital admissions to soar.
“NUMBER OF CASES IS RISING”
On Saturday, tight social mixing restrictions measures were brought in for London, southeast England and Wales while plans to ease curbs over Christmas across the nation were either dramatically scaled back or scrapped altogether.
Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick said the government’s coronavirus operations committee chaired by Prime Minister Boris Johnson would meet on Wednesday to decide if further action needed to be taken. “I can’t prejudge that. But we will be looking at the number of cases in all parts of the country. And in particular, what the variant is doing,” he told BBC TV.
However, asked if wider measures would be brought in the day after Christmas on Dec. 26, he said: “We don’t have an immediate plan to take action but the number of cases is rising and the variant is spreading to other parts of the country.”