Today is England’s last day under Plan B restrictions, brought in by the government at the beginning of last month to curb the spread of Omicron. Work-from-home guidance was scrapped last week, while mandatory face coverings in shops and on public transport — as well as the need to show vaccine passports at large venues — are to be lifted tomorrow.
Was there any point in these restrictions in the first place? We will never know, of course, what would have happened had the government not brought them in — no one has conducted a controlled experiment on an identical England where Plan B was never introduced.
But what we can do is to compare Covid death rates in England, where most restrictions were lifted on 19 July until Plan B came in last month, with death rates in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, where tougher restrictions outlasted those in England.
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