There is little optimism that life will soon return to normal after the virus outbreak, a poll for the Mirror reveals.
The Deltapoll survey shows that people fear they will be living under the cloud of Covid for some time.
Of those surveyed, 11% say it will take at least six months for life to return to normal, 13% say it will take nine months, 23% at least a year and 20% at least two years.
One in ten (10%) fear life will never be the same.
Only 36% are optimistic about the year ahead, with 21% quite pessimistic about the future and 9% very pessimistic.
Most people (54%) also believe the second wave of Covid has been worse than the first wave, with only 14% saying it has been less damaging than the initial outbreak.
A clear majority believe the vaccines are safe and effective, with 19% saying they think it will be very effective and 49% fairly effective.
Asked how safe they think the vaccine is, 27% said it was very safe, 41% fairly safe and just 7% “not at all safe.”
There is also widespread support for wearing a mask, with 84% backing the wearing of face coverings in indoor public spaces and 72% in favour of wearing a face covering in any public setting, indoors or outdoors.
Tackling Covid is also tops of the list of people's priorities for the new year, with 66% saying it is the most important issue facing the country in 2021, followed by the NHS (54%), the economy, 54%, unemployment (37%) and Brexit (33%).
By a small margin most people think the Government mishandled the coronavirus, with 46% saying it has made the wrong decisions compared to 41% who say it has got it right.
More than one in ten (13%) think they may have had Covid but have not been tested and one in five of those polled (20%) expect to catch coronavirus at some point.
More than half (53%) fear their friends or family will become infected, with 20% worried they could lose relatives or friends to Covid.
**Deltapoll interviewed 1,608 British adults online between 26 – 30 December 2020. The data have been weighted to be representative of the British adult population as a whole.
