Could Britain close its borders once lockdown ends?

The government’s most important economic policy is its vaccination programme, I say in the magazine this week. The speed at which people are immunised will determine when — and how quickly — the economy can reopen.

But even when the so-called ‘non-pharmaceutical interventions’ are lifted domestically, there will likely continue to be restrictions on those entering from abroad. The view is that testing and tighter procedures at the border will be needed to protect the UK from the danger of any vaccine-resistant strain. Priti Patel’s admission this week that the government should have shut the borders last March is revealing of the current conversations inside government on what to do, and the way in which they are going.

One thoughtful figure in government tells me that ‘the advantage the vaccine has given us is so huge that we have to protect that’.