Boris Johns has revealed a “conditional plan” to reopen society amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, allowing people to spend more time outdoors from Wednesday.
The PM of the United Kingdom said people who are working from home should return to their workplaces; however, they should avoid public transport.
The 55-year-old said a new COVID Alert System would govern how quickly lockdown restrictions could be eased, hoping that by June 1, some primary pupils could return to schools in England.
Addressing the nation, Johnson said this stage would also involve reopening shops; however, he warned that this would only happen if supported by science.
Johnson said these steps formed part of a “first sketch of a roadmap for reopening society.”
“This is not the time simply to end the lockdown this week,” he added. “Instead we are taking the first careful steps to modify our measures.”
The PM also the government would increase the fines for people who break the lockdown rules.
The new guidelines say that you can meet a person if you stay two meters apart, according to a government official. “People will also be allowed to drive to parks and beaches in England as long as they observe social distancing while there,” the official told BBC.
Laura Kuenssberg, Political Editor of BBC News, said while the coronavirus outbreak has started to come under control, Johnsons’ cautious announcement was “certainly not some kind of dramatic flinging of the doors open.”
Explaining how schools and shops would reopen, Johnson said, “Throughout this period of the next two months we will be driven not by mere hope or economic necessity. We are going to be driven by the science, the data, and public health. And I must stress again all of this is conditional, it all depends on a series of big ifs.”
The PM also explained how the “R” (reproduction rate of the virus) number would be important in deciding whether lockdown could be eased. Experts say that it is important to keep the R rate below 1 in order to ease down restrictions.
“It depends on all of us – the entire country – to follow the advice, to observe social distancing, and to keep that R down,” Johnson said.
Currently, there is no vaccine so the UK government is reliant on containing any local outbreaks. However, the problem is there still are big loopholes in the nation’s ability to contain the virus even after conducting extra testing over the last month.
Johnson also said he had consulted “across the political spectrum, across all four nations of the UK” and that his plan was “a general consensus on what we could do.” In the United Kingdom, COVID-19 has sickened more than 219,100 and killed over 31,850 people so far.
