UK health secretary says England will not make decision on further unlocking scheduled for 21 June until a week before
Matt Hancock insisted it is “appropriate” to continue with the major easing of restrictions in England on Monday despite concerns over the Indian variant.
However, he did not rule out that the easing of restrictions on Monday may have to be reversed if the variant prove to be very highly transmissible.
In England, a decision on whether all legal restrictions can be ended next month will be made on June 14, Matt Hancock said. The health secretary said there will be a “very, very large number of cases” if the Indian variant “gets out of hand”.
“We do need to make sure we don’t get that explosion in cases, so we need to be cautious, we need to be careful, we need to be vigilant.
“We will make a final decision for step 4, which is the biggest step in the road map, we will make that decision on June 14.”