Sajid Javid To Host Downing Street Covid Press Conference

It comes after Boris Johnson announced that Plan B measures were being dropped across England.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid speaks during a news conference last year.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid speaks during a news conference last year.
WPA Pool via Getty Images

Sajid Javid will address the public this afternoon after it was announced that covid restrictions are to be eased.

The health secretary will lead the Downing Street press conference this afternoon - expected at around 5pm.

It comes after Boris Johnson announced that Plan B measures aimed at tackling the spread of Covid-19 are to be dropped across England.

The prime minister told MPs that more than 90 per cent of over-60s across the UK have now had booster vaccines to protect them, and scientists believed the Omicron wave has peaked.

People will no longer be told to work from home and from Thursday next week mandatory Covid passes will end.

The legal requirement for people with covid to self-isolate will also be allowed to lapse when the regulations expire on March 24 - a date which could be brought forward.

The government will no longer make people wear face masks anywhere from next Thursday and they will be scrapped in classrooms from this Thursday, with school communal areas to follow.

Signalling his intention to start treating Covid-19 more like flu, Johnson added: “There will soon come a time when we can remove the legal requirement to self-isolate altogether, just as we don’t place legal obligations on people to isolate if they have flu.

“As Covid becomes endemic, we will need to replace legal requirements with advice and guidance, urging people with the virus to be careful and considerate of others.”

It comes as Covid infection levels fell in most parts of the UK for the first time since early December, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Mr Johnson said the data showed that while there are some places where cases are likely to continue rising, including in primary schools, “our scientists believe it is likely that the Omicron wave has now peaked nationally”.

The ONS data shows that one in 20 people in private households in England is estimated to have had coronavirus in the week to January 15.

That’s around three million people nationally, down from 3.7 million in the week to January 6.

Johnson told MPs the government now intended to set out its “long-term strategy for living with Covid-19”, adding: “Explaining how we hope and intend to protect our liberty and avoid restrictions in future by relying instead on medical advances, especially the vaccines which have already saved so many lives.

“But to make that possible we must all remain cautious during these last weeks of winter. There are still over 16,000 people in hospital in England alone. The pandemic is not over.”

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