UK lockdown: GP warns Covid a ‘lost battle’ as UK heads into ‘cosmetic’ new restrictions
Lockdown: GP warns ‘we’ve lost the battle’ and rules are ‘cosmetic’
The UK lockdown has been called “just cosmetic” by a leading private GP who believes Britain has “lost the battle” when it comes to curbing rising COVID-19 infections. Dr Laurence Gerlis told talkRADIO host Mike Graham the Government’s new restrictions were just “kicking the can down the road.” He added that the tactic of imposing nation-wide shutdowns was only “delaying the inevitable.”
Dr Gerlis said: “It is a horrible virus but we have lost the battle and all the lockdowns in the world are no more than cosmetic, making you think you are doing something.
“But with a combination of people breaking lockdowns and the fact you have to lift it at some point.
“I think we are just kicking the can down the road and delaying the inevitable”
The physician continued: “Let’s get some herd immunity now, let do what Patrick Vallance said back in March. Get some herd immunity, get thirty, forty per cent of the population protected.
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“At the same time, speed up the vaccination so between the two of them we will have seventy, eighty per cent of the population covered.
“By Easter, we can all get back to normal.”
Boris Johnson enforced a six-week lockdown on Monday night as coronavirus cases rapidly increase.
In a televised address to the nation on Monday evening, the Prime Minister pinned hopes on the rollout of vaccines to ease the restrictions in mid-February.
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Mr Johnson told the country to stay indoors other than for limited exceptions and bowed to significant pressure to order primary schools, secondaries and colleges to move to remote teaching for the majority of students from Tuesday.
His announcement came after Nicola Sturgeon imposed a lockdown on Scotland for the rest of January, with a legal requirement to stay at home and schools closing to most pupils until February.
In a bleak statement, Mr Johnson said the new variant of coronavirus, which is up to 70 per cent more transmissible, was spreading in a “frustrating and alarming” manner and warned that the number of COVID-19 patients in English hospitals is 40 per cent higher than the first peak.
He said people in the top four priority groups would receive a first vaccine dose by mid-February “if things go well and with a fair wind in our sails”, to allow restrictions in the nation’s third national lockdown to be eased.
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The latest measures have left some Tory MPs furious at the Government’s handling of the pandemic and others demanding the Prime Minister now outline exactly how he will return the country to normality in the coming months.
Mark Harper, a former Government whip and the chair of the lockdown-sceptic COVID Recovery Group, called on the Government to “urgently” explain how it will bring England out of the current restrictions.
He said: “The Government must urgently set out exactly how the vaccination rollout will translate into a return to normal life for us all in 2021, how and when it will lift restrictions and when our freedoms, economy and health prospects will be fully restored.
“These cycles of lockdowns and restrictions are not without downsides – impacting on jobs, health and life chances that will be visible for years to come.
“It’s vital we act as swiftly as we can to vaccinate those most at risk.”
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