Dominic Raab has said the Government will not even consider lifting the UK coronavirus lockdown this week.
The Foreign Secretary said the UK was still not "past the peak of the virus" and added that "we don't expect to make any changes to the measures currently in place" after scientific advisory group (SAGE) meets later this week.
He said the country could not afford to take its 'foot off the pedal' and risk a second wave of the virus.
Opening the daily press briefing, Mr Raab said the Government was united in its "national mission" to defeat Covid-19, which has claimed over 11,000 lives in the UK.
Mr Raab also paid tribute to members of the public who followed Government advice.
He said: "At the end of last week we were concerned that people might start ignoring the advice or cutting corners given the temptation to go out into the sunshine.
"In fact the overwhelming majority of people stayed at home and understood the importance of doing so.
"By staying home this weekend, you've saved lives.
"Thank you, your efforts are making all the difference.
"And please keep them up - we've come too far, we've lost too many loved ones and we've sacrificed too much to ease up now."
The UK death toll has reached 11,344 with 697 more patients reported to have died in the last 24 hours.
However that figure is a drop for the second day in a row.
The NHS reported 667 new deaths in hospitals in England on Monday, while Wales recorded 15, Scotland nine and Northern Ireland six.
After reading out figures on the coronavirus death toll, Mr Raab said there were "positive signs" from the data that the UK was "starting to win" the struggle against the virus.
He added: "But we've still got a long way to go, and as those grisly figures that I've just read out show, we've still not passed the peak of this virus."
He explained that this week the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) would review the evidence of the effectiveness of social distancing measures.
"We don't expect to make any changes to the measures currently in place at that point and we won't until we're confident, as confident as we realistically can be, that any such changes can be safely made," Mr Raab added.
Commenting on accusations the Government lacked an exit strategy, Mr Raab said: "It's absolutely crucially important that we do not take our eye off the ball or the public's focus on the thing that has been a success so far in relative terms - which is our ability through widespread support for our social distancing measures to deprive this virus of the means to spread."
When asked how long the plateau is expected to last, Chief Scientific Advisor Sir Patrick Vallance said: "We would expect a much more gradual decrease (of deaths) from the peak time and a bit of a plateau... and we'd expect that to go on for two or three weeks."
Earlier today it was reported that Boris Johnson had tested negative for coronavirus on leaving St Thomas' Hospital in central London.
He spoke to Mr Raab over the weekend although the Prime Minister is not doing any government work as he continues his recovery at Chequers.
Number 10 also said more than 40,000 NHS staff have been tested for coronavirus, with a slight reduction in the number of healthcare forced to miss work.
The NHS employs roughly 1.4m staff across the UK.
There has been speculation about the Government proposing an end date for the lockdown.
China earlier reported a peak in new cases of coronavirus with 108 confirmed, the highest in the past five weeks, with almost all the new cases believed to be Chinese nationals returning home.
Spain has eased lockdown restrictions today with some non-essential workers returning to work wearing face masks - this is despite the country still registering 517 deaths in the last day.
