Covid restrictions eased across the UK
Pint-starved punters have been braving snow, sleet and freezing temperatures for dawn haircuts and 9am Prosecco as Covid restrictions ease.
In England, pubs, cafes and restaurants have been welcoming customers outside while gyms, zoos, salons and indoor swimming pools have also reopened.
All pupils are now returning to school full time in Scotland and Wales. Northern Ireland’s stay at home order has been replaced with advice to “stay local”.
Plans for Boris Johnson’s own celebratory pint have been put on hold following the death of Prince Philip. But he did get a haircut.
The PM urged everyone to “behave responsibly” as experts advised caution. Adam Kucharski of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, a member of the government’s Spi-M modelling group, warned that cases could rise quickly with so many people still unvaccinated and that “restrictions still do the hard work in keeping transmission down.”
A rise in case numbers is almost inevitable, although it’s encouraging to see that there has been no obvious spike in infections after schools returned in England on 8 March.
Yet it’s hard to see how the rollout could have gone much better since the dark days of early January when the third lockdown was announced. Incredibly, the government has now met its target of offering a vaccine to all 32 million (!) people in the nine highest priority groups – everyone over 50 and younger people with chronic conditions – two days ahead of schedule. Case numbers matter to the extent that they lead to hospitalisations and deaths, and these nine groups have accounted for 99 per cent of preventable Covid deaths and 85 per cent of hospitalisations.
Over 400,000 second doses were given out on each of the last four days – a record number – meaning over 7 million of the most vulnerable have now been fully vaccinated. People in their 40s will now start to be offered the vaccine.
What’s more, the first Covid treatment outside hospital has been approved today, after Oxford University researchers found that inhaling budesonide, a cheap asthma drug, cut illness times by three days. As bonkers Brits queue round the block for Primark and Thorpe Park, it’s hard not to feel optimistic.
MPs remember Prince Philip and Shirley Williams
The Duke of Edinburgh “made this country a better place”, Boris Johnson said today as MPs returned to the Commons a day early to pay their respects to the late royal.
Leading the tributes, the PM said that although Prince Philip “occasionally drove a coach and horses through the finer points of diplomatic protocol”, he “touched the lives of millions” with his “novel ideas”.
MPs spoke of the Duke’s forward-thinking attitudes on the environment, his “devotion to duty”, his unfailing support of the Queen and the impact his D of E award had on the lives of young people.
MPs have also paid tribute to Shirley Williams, the Lib Dem peer and one of the ‘gang of four’ who split from Labour to form Social Democratic party in 1981, who died today aged 90.
Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, said Williams’ death was “heartbreaking for me and for our whole Liberal Democrat family… Shirley has been an inspiration to millions, a Liberal lion and a true trailblazer. I feel privileged to have known her, listened to her and worked with her… Political life will be poorer without her intellect, her wisdom and her generosity.”
Space age turns 60
Sixty years ago today, on 12 April 1961, Yuri Gagarin, a Soviet Air Force pilot, became the first human to leave planet Earth.
The success of the mission kept the USSR ahead of the US in the Space Race. It was a crucial propaganda coup, proving to many that the Soviet Union was the world’s number one scientific and intellectual power.
On his return, Gagarin was feted around the world and became a superman in the eyes of the Soviet people. Russians are still intensely proud that it was their charming 27 year-old with an easy smile who made history.
Russian politics is still informed by the nation’s fall from its heady heights as a global superpower. A Ukrainian soldier was killed by Russian-backed separatists yesterday as an estimated 80,000 Russian troops massed on the border with Ukraine. Of all the regions the Russian Empire lost after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Ukraine was the biggest blow. The country is a vast buffer zone separating Russia from its enemies in the West and is thought of as the birthplace of the Russian nation.
Putin’s interest in Ukraine, and the decision to name Russia’s Covid vaccine after the satellite Moscow sent into orbit in 1957, are, in their own ways, attempts to recapture the lost prestige encapsulated by Yuri Gagarin’s first voyage to the stars.
Mattie Brignal,
News Editor