The British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, announced today, Monday, a new national blockade that will last at least until mid-February to combat a new variety of rapidly spreading coronavirus.
Johnson said the country was in a “critical moment” and that cases were growing rapidly in all parts of the country.
Under the new rules, which will come into force as soon as possible, elementary and secondary schools and universities will be closed for face-to-face learning, except for children of essential workers. Students will not return until at least mid-February.
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All non-essential shops and personal care services, such as hairdressing salons, will be closed, and restaurants may only offer removal services.
As of Monday, there were 26,626 patients with COVID in hospitals in England, an increase of over 30% compared to a week ago. This is 40% above the highest level of the first wave of spring.
Also Monday, the United Kingdom took another major step in the fight against COVID-19 months, offering the world’s first vaccine injections developed by Oxford University and the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, thus strengthening its inoculation program.
Brian Pinker, an 82-year-old dialysis patient, became the first person to be inoculated by a primary care nurse at Oxford University Hospital. Pinker said he was very happy to have been vaccinated, noting that “I’m looking forward to celebrating my 48th wedding anniversary with my wife Shirley later this year.”
As of December 8, the UK National Health Service (NHS) is using a vaccine produced by Pfizer and the German company BioNTech to inoculate health workers, as well as residents of nursing homes and their staff. The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine strengthens that arsenal and is cheaper and easier to use because it does not require storage at extremely cold temperatures, such as Pfizer.
Oxford-AstraZeneca is administered in a small number of hospitals in the UK in the early days, so that the authorities can look for any side effects. But hundreds of new vaccination sites – both in hospitals and in local doctors’ offices – will begin implementing it this week, joining the more than 700 already in operation, the NHS said.
In a deviation from practice in the United States and elsewhere, the United Kingdom now intends to offer people a second dose of both vaccines 12 weeks after the first injection, rather than 21 days later, to speed up the dose. immunize as many people as possible as soon as possible.
Deputy Chief Medical Officer Jonathan Van-Tam said on Sunday that the decision “is what needs to be done for the whole nation.”
The UK is in the midst of an acute outbreak, with over 50,000 new coronavirus infections daily in the last six days. On Sunday, it registered another 54,990 cases and 454 additional deaths related to the coronavirus, which already adds 75,024 deaths during the pandemic, one of the highest figures in Europe.