Liverpool’s director of public health warned today that Level 2 restrictions are failing to prevent a spike in virus cases in the latest suggestion that stricter measures are on the way.
Matt Ashton said the Tier 2 restrictions, which Liverpool have been subject to since the end of the national lockdown on December 2, were “not strong enough” to prevent a resurgence of the disease.
Ashton’s comments came on the same day that the ONS infection survey confirmed that there was a new kind of CoronavirusThe, which is believed to be behind the rate of missile cases in London and the southeast, is now present across the country.
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Yesterday, the government’s chief science advisor, Patrick Vallance, said there could potentially be other regions Added to the list of Level 4 regions Currently in use across the southeast.
Mr. Ashton said today that the infection rate is in Liverpool It continued to rise as the city headed towards Christmas.
He said, “We have maintained 14 days until December 14 of being below 100 cases per 100,000, which is absolutely exceptional, as we emerged from the national lockdown to Level 2 after entering a Level 3 position.
“Unfortunately, the nature of the Level 2 controls is that they are not strong enough to prevent the rate of infection returning to the other side, so the rate has continued to increase and we are now 143 cases per 100,000.”
In response to a question from panelist Cllr Richard Kemp, about potential new restrictions, Ashton said he expects the infection rate to continue to increase for at least the next few weeks.
He said, “It seems to go up at about 10 to 15 per 100,000 per day and I think this will continue to increase and we have a vulnerability around Christmas where people, although there are guidelines there, are gathering.”
“This will definitely lead to more casualties.”
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The new variant of Corona Virus It has disrupted the government’s approach to containing the virus, with the original plans for five days of effectively easing restrictions torn apart.
Early assessments of this variant indicate that it may spread more easily than other previously prevalent virus strains, although scientists caution that more work is needed to screen the variant more thoroughly.
There is no indication at this stage that it causes more or less severe disease or that approved vaccines will not work against the new variant.
The head of BioNTech, the company behind the first vaccine approved for use in the UK, said that even if that were the case, they could produce a vaccine to treat the new variant within six weeks.
