Sajid Javid today warned there are ‘no guarantees’ Christmas Day will go ahead without a lockdown as Boris Johnson desperately fends off alarming warnings from scientists.
The Health Secretary admitted ‘everything is under review’ after SAGE delivered a grim assessment that the number of infections could reach two million by the end of the month without tougher restrictions – floating a ‘circuit breaker’ ban on households mixing and closure of non-essential shops.
Medical and science chiefs Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance briefed the Cabinet yesterday that more measures are required to stop hospital admissions soaring above 3,000 per day in England.
Modelling suggests that with no government interventions or lockdowns beyond Plan B measures, the peak could be as high as 10,000 hospitalisations a day and the daily death toll might reach 6,000.
This figure, which is the worst case scenario and references the high transmissibility of the Omicron variant, is based on the assumption that there will be behavioural changes such as increased mixing between households over the Christmas period.
The modelling suggests that if the Government implemented measures equivalent to step 2 on the roadmap out of lockdown, which included a ban on mixing households indoors and international holidays, the peak would reach 7,000 hospital admissions a day with up to 3,000 deaths a day.
If the Government was to implement measures equivalent to step 1 on the roadmap out of lockdown, including the closure of all but essential retail and social contact restricted to one other household for outdoor exercise only, the modelling suggests a peak of 5,000 hospitalisations a day with 2,000 deaths.
