Boris Johnson’s Covid double act

Boris Johnson used today’s press conference to unveil the government’s plan for stage four of the roadmap. Announcing that the public need to learn to live with Covid, the Prime Minister declared his intention from 19 July to reopen all remaining businesses, lift limits on gatherings and lift the bulk of rules on wearing a mask. While no final decision on what happens on 19 July will be made until next week, Johnson said it was time to move away from ‘legal restrictions and allow people to make their own informed decisions’.

Although the contents of the PM’s statement points towards a big bang reopening, Johnson’s tone was rather more cautious. He warned that by 19 July cases could have reach ‘50,000 cases detected per day’, which means more deaths from Covid are inevitable. While face masks will no longer be mandatory, Johnson suggested that there will still be settings where it would be a good idea to wear one. 

Johnson gave the example of a busy tube train at rush hour as a time when a mask could be sensible, compared to an empty train carriage in the evening when it could be surplus to requirements.