Covid news: Boris Johnson urges UK to keep Christmas celebrations small as death toll passes 65,000
Follow the latest updates on the pandemic
Sign up for our free Health Check email to receive exclusive analysis on the week in health
Get our free Health Check email
Boris Johnson has urged Britons to “have yourself a merry little Christmas" but keep celebrations small and brief, adding: “I’m afraid this year I do mean little.”
The prime minister told MPs that the four UK nations have agreed to continue "in principle" with the easing of coronavirus restrictions over Christmas, allowing up to three households to mix for five days.
However, the Welsh and Scottish leaders appeared to have undermined the prime minister’s claim of an agreement, with Mark Drakeford saying only two households should come together in Wales and Nicola Sturgeon saying Scots should only meet for one day.
And opposition leader Keir Starmer accused Mr Johnson of ignoring medical advice over the Christmas plan.
The PM said he did not want to “criminalise people’s long-made plans” for the festive season, but urged people to “exercise a high degree of personal responsibility”.
The World Health Organisation has warned Europeans to have a quiet Christmas or risk a renewed surge of the disease.
Earlier, the communities secretary admitted the Covid-19 infection rate would rise as people mix together over Christmas.
"This is a virus that thrives on social interaction, so bringing more people together, even over this short period of time, is not cost-free. It will have consequences in terms of increasing the rate. It will rise," Robert Jenrick said.
Meanwhile, it was announced that nearly 138,000 people in the UK received a first dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine over the last week.
Follow the latest updates
Lionel Blair said it meant a "great deal" to have been given the Covid-19 jab - as he dubbed those who turn it down "crazy".
The Name That Tune presenter, 92, received the first of two vaccine injections at an NHS vaccine centre, set up in the grounds of the horse racing course at Epsom, Surrey.
"I couldn't believe it when they called me and said, 'It's next week and then the next one is in January' and here I am," he said.
"I'm just ... thinking, thank God I live here."
The entertainer added: "I'm hoping it's going to make me live a bit longer! And seeing my grandchildren and children growing up.
"The whole thing means a great deal to me."
Boris Johnson and England's chief medical officer professor Chris Whitty are giving a Downing Street press conference now.
Boris Johnson urges Britons to keep festive celebrations small
Boris Johnson has appealed to Britons to keep festive celebrations small-scale and brief, saying: “Have yourself a merry little Christmas, and I’m afraid this year I do mean little”.
Political editor Andrew Woodcock reports:
Boris Johnson urges Britons to keep Christmas celebrations small
Boris Johnson has appealed to Britons to keep festive celebrations small-scale and brief, saying: “Have yourself a merry little Christmas, and I’m afraid this year I do mean little”.
Avoid Boxing Day sales crowds, prime minister says
Boris Johnson also said people should avoid crowds.
The prime minister said: "And whatever your plans for Christmas, please think carefully about avoiding crowds in the Boxing Day sales.
"And no one should be gathering in large groups to see in the New Year."
He added: "If you have an elderly relative you might want to delay seeing them until they have been vaccinated."
Government made ‘judgment’ about ‘how people are going to behave anyway’, Johnson says
Responding to a questions from a member of the public about allowing mixing at Christmas, Mr Johnson said the government had to make a "judgment" about "how people are going to behave anyway" and their "natural instinct to want to see their families".
He added: "What we're trying to do is to set the parameters that we think are sensible and we've come up with a maximum that we think is sensible across the whole of the UK.
"Everybody should exercise personal responsibility, judging yourselves how best to reduce the contact, the meeting of other people that is the way of spreading this disease."
Virus has forced ‘really hard choices’ between ‘two bad options’, Prof Whitty says
Professor Chris Whitty said the virus had forced authorities to make "really hard choices" between "two bad options".
This involved balancing the "natural wish" of people wanting to get together at Christmas, which was important for mental health, alongside the risk posed by people gathering in groups.
He added: "We're forced into this incredibly difficult choice where both the options are bad options and the aim is to try to find some middle way between the difficult options we have to have."
Relaxing rules will lead to increase in deaths, England’s chief medical officer warns
Prof Whitty said the modelling shows that relaxing the rules will lead to an increase in deaths.
He said: "Any kind of period where people come together in groups that otherwise wouldn't meet leads to an increase in risks and that will lead to an increase in hospitalisations and deaths.
"That's been consistently what we've said will happen, not just scientists but political leaders, but what we've tried to do is to then find out what are the things you can do to reduce the risk.
"Reducing this number of households who meet up together to the lowest you can manage in this period, shortening the period of time, because shortening the period of time also has an important effect, and reducing the movement of people from high transmission areas to low transmission areas, all of these, modelling and other forms of science, all make clear will reduce the risk significantly further than if we didn't do those."
‘Significant problem’ if every household takes it to limit over Christmas
Prof Whitty made a comparison with driving at 70mph on an icy road and acknowledged if every household takes it to the limit during Christmas there would be a "significant problem".
He said: "This is the equivalent of us saying these are icy and treacherous conditions, if you wish to have a driving analogy, we should be doing the minimum necessary still within the law.
"Just because you can doesn't mean you should.
"Obviously if everybody pushes it right to the limit in every single household that would be a significant problem but I think it is very unlikely that will happen."
He said most people are taking these decisions to manage the risk "incredibly seriously".
"I do not think everybody is going to take it to the limit, I think people are being as always, as they have all the way through this, are going to be incredibly responsible about it in the great majority of cases," he added.
One of the first pensioners to be vaccinated against coronavirus says people ‘very silly’ to turn down jab
Joyce Dowd is 94 years old and has recently become a great great grandmother. She received the vaccination in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, at a new GP-run centre.
Now that she has been vaccinated, Ms Dowd intends to visit her great-great grandchild, born during the pandemic, for the first time.
Her fourth great-great grandchild is expected in February but Ms Dowd has said that she will only visit the children when she is sure that it is safe to do so.
Read more:
One of the first pensioners to be vaccinated against coronavirus says people ‘very silly’ to turn down jab
Joyce Dowd reported feeling a little stiff but fine after the vaccination
Ethnic minorities less likely to take coronavirus vaccine
People from ethnic minority backgrounds or with lower incomes are less likely to take the coronavirus vaccine being rolled out in Britain, research suggested Wednesday, raising concerns about whether the jab would reach the communities that have been hit disproportionately hard by the pandemic.
A survey by Britain's Royal Society for Public Health said that while three-quarters of those polled would take a COVID-19 vaccine if advised to do so by a doctor, that figure fell to 57% among Black people and those from Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds.
The body also said the survey "revealed significantly more hesitancy among lower income groups" — with 70% of lowest earners likely to agree to the jab, compared to 84% of highest earners.
Public health experts and doctors say the findings are concerning, but unsurprising. They align with consistently lower uptake rates of other vaccines, like the measles and flu jabs, among ethnic minority communities and in poorer neighborhoods, they say.
That reluctance — a result of factors like public health messaging not reaching the communities and mistrust of authority based on past experiences — has been exacerbated by misinformation and anti-vaccination campaigns on social media.
AP
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments