Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label UK coronavirus cases are still too high to ease lockdown

UK coronavirus cases are still too high to ease lockdown, member of secretive SAGE committee warns

NewsColony UK coronavirus cases are still too high to ease lockdown, member of secretive SAGE committee warns Leading scientists have poured cold water on hopes the lockdown could be relaxed, warning the rate of new infections is still too high.   Tacking to a containment strategy based on rigorous testing and contact tracing is widely touted as the route to easing restrictions. But the UK’s track-and-trace infrastructure would cripple under the load of daily cases at their current levels, experts have said. They have lined up behind Professor John Edmunds, who sits on the government’s scientific advisory group, Sage, to not jump the gun on lifting the social distancing. The warnings came as Britain passed the grim 20,000-death milestone in the coronavirus outbreak. A further 813 recorded fatalities took the total toll to 20,319, while cases also rose by 4,913 to 148,377. Professor Edmunds, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said this influx of...