Times title: Covid will always kill and we have to accept that, says Michael Gove
By: Steven Swinford, Chris Smyth, Henry Zeffman,
Date: 15 June 2021
“The country needs to learn to live with the coronavirus even if it causes hundreds of deaths a day, Michael Gove has suggested.
The Cabinet Office minister said that the government wanted to “get rid of every possible restriction” but that some changes, such as working from home, were likely to stay.
“We have to accept that this virus will circulate, and it will be the case, unfortunately, that in winters to come we will find that people contract it or subsequent variants and they will fall ill,” Gove told Times Radio.
Note LO: see article for diagram on “The average number of contacts in the UK during the pandemic”.
“Unfortunately there are respiratory diseases, including flu itself, which do every year result in an upsurge of people being taken into hospital, and in some cases suffering tragic consequences.”
Asked whether there was a need to accept there would be deaths, he said: “It’s important that, while we do accept that, we also do everything that we can — consistent with society running normally — to protect people.
“It’s not the case that we are blasé or shoulder-shrugging about it.”
Last night the government delayed plans to end all social distancing rules and lift remaining restrictions on June 21 by four weeks, after a sharp rise in coronavirus cases.
Graham Medley, a member of the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said it was “quite possible” that the number of deaths from the virus could reach hundreds a day.
Medley told Today on BBC Radio 4 that this would “easily” have happened if the government had not delayed its planned June 21 lockdown easing.
Note LO: see article for diagram on “The road to full vaccination”.
Asked about Medley’s claim that there could be hundreds of deaths, Gove responded: “We are going to have to learn to live with Covid.”
He told the BBC: “It’s a very nasty virus. We can provide people with the best protection possible, through the vaccination programme, but as with flu, we know that there are a number of people who contract it.”
Gove added that there would be no return to life as it was before the pandemic.
“I suspect it may be the case that we may see different workplaces allowing people to work from home at certain points as well as coming into the office. I suspect there may be changes to the way that we live,” he said. “We won’t go back to the status quo.”
Medley suggested that the government could face difficult decisions about reimposing some restrictions.
“Depending on what the government want to achieve, they may well have to take decisions that are against what they would much prefer not to do, which is to make the changes that we’ve got irreversible,” he said.
“It is possible we could end up with a situation where numbers of people going to hospital really mean that the government have to take some kind of action that they don’t want to.”
Gove said he was “confident” that the new July 19 date for lifting all restrictions would be kept.
“The figure that’s driving us is the number of people who are vaccinated,” he said. “If we can vaccinate the adult population, then that provides us . . . the best possible defence.”
Boris Johnson announced yesterday that the vaccination programme would be accelerated to protect more people and insisted July 19 would be the new “terminus date”. However, concern is mounting in the cabinet and on the Tory back benches that the rapid spread of the Indian variant could force the government to delay the easing of restrictions for more than a month.
Johnson said that it was “sensible to wait just a little longer” and “give the NHS a few more crucial weeks to get those remaining jabs into the arms of those who need them”. He said: “Now is the time to ease off the accelerator. Because by being cautious now we have the chance in the next four weeks to save many thousands of lives by vaccinating millions more people.”
The only exceptions will be an end to the 30-person limit for weddings, while crowds will be allowed into sporting events such as Euro 2020 matches, Wimbledon and the British Formula One Grand Prix. Care home residents will be allowed to go on visits without needing to self-isolate for 14 days when they return.
The limit on guests at weddings will be dropped from Monday. Capacity will still be limited by the size of the venue and the need for social distancing. Dancing and stand-up drinks receptions will not be allowed.
Johnson’s science advisers agreed that little more would be gained by a delay beyond four weeks, with modelling saying that the pause would reduce a peak of cases in August by up to half.
Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientific adviser, said that the next few weeks would bring a “double protection” as the over-40s gained the benefit of a second dose and young adults had their first one. Delaying the end of restrictions until close to the school holidays would “also take the pressure off, and that should between them significantly reduce the peak”, he said.
Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer for England, said that “no one thinks at the end of the four-week delay the risk has gone — there will still be substantial numbers in hospital”. He said, though, that this needed to be balanced against the harms of restrictions. The prime minister announced a series of new targets to accelerate first and second doses. He said that the gap between doses for people in their 40s would be cut from 12 to eight weeks, meaning that everyone over 40 would have been offered a second dose by the week of July 19. In addition, all adults would have been offered a first dose by July 19.
Johnson’s MPs expressed concern over the delay. Sir Charles Walker, vice-chairman of the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers, said it was now likely that “we will end up with some form of lockdown” for the rest of the year.
Jeremy Hunt, the former health secretary, criticised the government for claiming that the path out of restrictions would be irreversible.”
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