{"id":330034,"date":"2021-01-05T04:24:39","date_gmt":"2021-01-05T04:24:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=330034"},"modified":"2021-01-05T04:24:39","modified_gmt":"2021-01-05T04:24:39","slug":"uk-pm-boris-johnson-imposes-lockdown-in-england-amid-rising-covid-19-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/uk-pm-boris-johnson-imposes-lockdown-in-england-amid-rising-covid-19-cases\/","title":{"rendered":"UK PM Boris Johnson imposes lockdown in England amid rising COVID-19 cases"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday announced a lockdown for England’s 56 million people after a surge in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations across the country.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSince the pandemic began last year, the whole United Kingdom has been engaged in a great national effort to fight Covid and there is no doubt that in fighting the old variant of the virus, our collective efforts were working and would have continued to work. But we now have a new variant of the virus. It has been both frustrating and alarming to see the speed with which the new variant is spreading,\u201d Johnson said in a televised address.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur scientists have confirmed this new variant is between 50 and 70 per cent more transmissible \u2013 that means you are much, much more likely to catch the virus and to pass it on. Our hospitals are under more pressure from Covid than at any time since the start of the pandemic,\u201d the Prime Minister said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Johnson said the number of Covid patients in hospitals has increased by nearly a third in the last week, to almost 27,000 – 40 percent more than at the peak of the first wave of the outbreak in April last year.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOn 29 December, more than 80,000 people tested positive for Covid across the UK \u2013 a new record,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Johnson pointed out that the number of deaths in the country over the last one week were up by 20 per cent and will rise further.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWith most of the country already under extreme measures, it is clear that we need to do more, together, to bring this new variant under control while our vaccines are rolled out,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Johnson said that citizens may be permitted to leave home for limited reasons such as to shop for essentials, to work if you absolutely cannot work from home, to exercise, to seek medical assistance such as getting a Covid test, or to escape domestic abuse.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Prime Minister said, \u201cprimary schools, secondary schools and colleges across England must move to remote provision from tomorrow, except for vulnerable children and the children of key workers.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday announced a lockdown for England’s 56 million people after a surge in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations across the country. \u201cSince the pandemic began last year, the whole United Kingdom has been engaged in a great national effort to fight Covid and there is no doubt that in fighting […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":330044,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[53],"tags":[12253,1783],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330034"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330034"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330034\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":330045,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330034\/revisions\/330045"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/330044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}