All remaining Covid restrictions in England – including the legal rule to self-isolate – could end later this month, Boris Johnson has said.
Under the current rules, anyone who tests positive must self-isolate for at least five full days.
The current restrictions are due to expire on 24 March.
But Mr Johnson told MPs he expected the last domestic rules would end early as long as the positive trends in the data continued.
He said he intended to return after parliamentary recess – which runs from Thursday to 21 February – to outline the government’s strategy for living with Covid.
“It is my intention to return on the first day after the half-term recess to present our strategy for living with Covid,” Mr Johnson said at the start of Prime Minister’s Questions.
“Provided the current encouraging trends in the data continue, it is my expectation that we will be able to end the last domestic restrictions – including the legal requirement to self-isolate if you test positive – a full month early.”
The law will be replaced with guidance, Downing Street said – and for example people will be urged not to go to work if they have Covid.
The proportion of hospital patients with Covid-19 admitted to intensive care fell dramatically during the Omicron wave last month, raising the prospect that the disease is no longer a major critical care issue.
A combination of the milder variant, the booster vaccine roll-out and better treatments, including antivirals, has radically reduced the need for Covid patients to need ventilation or other critical care.
It comes as the World Health Organisation’s Europe leader Dr Hans Kluge said yesterday that the continent was reaching the “plausible endgame” of the pandemic.
When the Delta strain was the dominant variant in November, about 9 per cent of patients with Covid were transferred to intensive care.
This fell to around 2 per cent in January, when Omicron had taken over as the dominant variant.
And of the 2 per cent who were admitted to critical care in January, around half were being treated for other illnesses as the main reason for hospital treatment, according to the report by the Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre, whose figures cover England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
In November under Delta, and since the start of the pandemic, between 90 and 95 per cent of Covid patients in intensive care were being treated for Covid as the primary reason.
By January, under Omicron, this fell to below 50 per cent, with the other half receiving treatment for other primary illnesses.
As of 1 February, there were 483 people in intensive care with Covid, half the number in November and the lowest figure since early July.
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Britain will start rolling out Pfizer’s (PFE.N) COVID-19 pill to vulnerable people next month, the health ministry said on Friday, targeting the treatment at people with compromised immune systems for whom the vaccine can be less effective.
The health ministry said that Pfizer’s antiviral treatment Paxlovid, a combination of Pfizer’s pill with an older antiviral ritonavir, will be made available to thousands of people from Feb. 10.
“It is fantastic news that this new treatment, the latest cutting-edge drug that the NHS is rolling out through new COVID-19 medicine delivery units, will now be available to help those at highest risk of COVID-19,” National Health Service medical director Stephen Powis said.
“Trials have shown it can reduce hospitalisation and risk of death by 88%, meaning we’ll be in the best position to save thousands of lives.”
Britain has ordered 2.75 million courses of Paxlovid, and the government said that it would set out further details on access to the treatment soon but that people who are immunocompromised, cancer patients or those with Down’s Syndrome could be able to access it directly.
https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/britain-start-rolling-out-pfizer-covid-pill-next-month-2022-01-28/