The Prime Minister has laid out a five point plan he hopes will keep the country out of lockdown for good.
England is on the cusp of having all but the last of its coronavirus restrictions thrown off as cases of the deadly virus soar.
Today, on what some glass-half-full people have dubbed Freedom Day, England reaches Stage Four of the Government's lockdown exit plan.
After a four week delay, 19 July will mark the end of almost all legal restrictions on daily life.
Nightclubs have reopened, social distancing has been scrapped and the use of face coverings made a matter of "personal choice".
When he announced the lockdown exiting roadmap in the winter, Boris Johnson said it was "cautious but irreversible".
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Whether or not that is indeed the case - with coronavirus case numbers shooting up across the country to reach levels last seen in January - remains to be seen.
Last night the Prime Minister, holed up in self-isolation at the publicly owned country mansion Chequers, detailed a five point plan he hopes will keep future lockdowns away.
It is:
- Reinforce vaccine defences by reducing the dosing interval from 12 to 8 weeks for all adults.
- Emphasising caution and personal responsibility as cases continue to rise.
- The test, trace and isolate system will remain, with all positive cases legally required to self-isolate. Contacts of positive cases are required to self-isolate until the 16 August, after which adults who have received two vaccine doses and all under 18s will be exempt.
- Border controls will be maintained, including quarantine for all those travelling from a red list country, and for amber list countries unless double vaccinated.
- Data will be continually assessed and contingency measures retained if needed during higher risk periods, but restrictions will be avoided if possible.
While the plan to lift restrictions in England has been in place for many months, it is being realised at a precarious stage of the pandemic.
Today 48,161 new cases were reported in the UK, a rise of 50% in just a week.
Professor Neil Ferguson has warned that the country could soon be enduring 200,000 coronavirus infections a day.
Although the Government is insisting that the link between cases and hospitalisations and deaths is "substantially weakened due to the vaccination programme", concerns remain.
“if you have enough cases, you can still have quite significant burden on the healthcare system … major disruption of services and cancellation of elective surgery and the backlog in the NHS getting longer and longer," said Prof Ferguson, whose initial modelling helped shape Britain’s coronavirus lockdown strategy.
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The huge case number could also see many hundreds of thousands more people begin to suffer from Long Covid.
Earlier this week 1,200 scientists from across the Globe said that letting cases rip among a highly vaccinated population, such as England's, could lead to dangerous, vaccine resistant coronavirus mutations to emerge.
It is against this trouble backdrop that Johnson has issued a warning to the public.
Speaking in a video posted on Twitter, Mr Johnson said: "Go forward tomorrow into the next step with all the right prudence and respect for other people and the risks that the disease continues to present.
“And, above all, please, please, please when you’re asked to get that second jab and get your jab, please come forward and do it."
The plea came after Johnson invoked the fury of tens of thousands of people stuck inside on the hottest day of the year so far by delivering one of the government's sharpest u-turns yet.
This morning No 10 announced that Johnson and Chancellor Rishi Sunak would carry on working in Downing Street while taking daily tests, having come into contact with coronavirus positive Health Minister Sajid Javid.
They planned to do so as part of a programme being trialled across 20 public and private sector organisations including Border Force and Network Rail as well as the Cabinet Office and No 10.
What appeared to be an exclusive scheme only for those with their hands on the levers of power struck many as deeply unfair, triggering a fierce response which then prompted the leaders to quickly backtrack.
