UK records highest daily coronavirus death toll since April

The UK reported on Wednesday that on its last day it added 1,041 coronavirus deaths, the highest figure since April 21, while UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson defended the third lockdown he imposed on England before the need to vaccinate the most vulnerable population.

Authorities have also reported 62,322 cases, a daily record since the start of the pandemic, and the number of hospitalized for the virus has exceeded 30,000 nationwide for the first time.

In total, more than 2.8 million people have been infected and 77,346 have died in the country since the outbreak of the pandemic.

England needed a third lockdown to vaccinate the most vulnerable population between January and February, Johnson told Parliament today, which was preparing to adopt the measure retroactively.

“After last year’s marathon, we are in a race to vaccinate vulnerable people faster than the virus can reach them,” said the prime minister, whose decision, suddenly announced on Monday evening, went into effect yesterday.

“But if we want to win this race, we must give our army of vaccinators the greatest possible advantage” and “to do this, we must again stay at home”, added the Prime Minister, quoted by the agency of AFP press.

England’s 56 million people entered their third national lockdown yesterday, following those of March and November, which will be in effect by law until March 31, according to legislation presented to the House of Commons on Wednesday .

The date came as a surprise as Johnson said on Monday that the lockdown would last until mid-February.

The Prime Minister told MPs on Wednesday that he would rule until the last day of March to allow for a “controlled” relaxation of restrictions and a gradual return to England’s previous system of dividing up in areas at different levels of risk in depending on their health situation.

The law expires at the end of next March “not because we hope that full national containment will continue until then, but to allow a return to levels of risk by regions that is continuous, controlled and based on evidence, ”he said.

As for the rest of the UK, Scotland began a new full lockdown yesterday in January, while already partially contained Wales and Northern Ireland have closed their schools.

Despite resistance from some MPs in Johnson’s Conservative Party, the measure for England is expected to be approved by a very large majority thanks to the support of the Labor opposition.

Its leader, Keir Starmer, who has been calling for new containment for days, once again criticized the slowness and inconstancy of the Government in the management of the pandemic.

“It’s not just bad luck, it’s not inevitable, it follows a pattern of” government slowness in responding to the crisis, “Starmer said.

Pioneering Western countries in the vaccination campaign, which began on December 8, the UK has already inoculated 1.3 million people with the vaccines developed by Pfizer / BioNTech and AstraZeneca / Oxford, Johnson said yesterday.

The Executive has set itself the goal of vaccinating all over 70s by mid-February, in addition to health workers, nearly 14 million people.

“The vaccination schedule is realistic but not easy”, admitted yesterday the government medical adviser Chris Whitty at a press conference, a goal described as “very ambitious, but achievable” by the secretary of state in charge of the campaign, Nadhim Zahawi. .