The care minister has admitted New Year's Eve parties in the UK may need to be scrapped.
Gillian Keegan refused to rule out measures being introduced after Christmas to combat the growing threat of the Omicron variant.
Boris Johnson said the data is "under constant review" when he confirmed new restrictions will not be imposed before December 25.
READ MORE: People may have 'super immunity' to covid new study finds
However, the Prime Minister is reportedly weighing up a return to "step two" restrictions in England after Christmas.
The additional measures would place a ban on indoor social mixing and Ms Keegan said there is "uncertainty" over whether people should go ahead with a gathering or party on December 31.
She told LBC: "There is uncertainty. We can't predict what the data is going to tell us before we've got the data.
"We are trying to take a balanced and proportionate approach so that people can see their families over Christmas to try and plan some stuff.
"But of course it is difficult to anticipate."
Labour has urged the government to give the public certainty on its post-Christmas plans as soon as possible.
Shadow work and pensions secretary Jon Ashworth told Sky News: "People need to know where they stand. Businesses have got to make decisions about what stock to get in in the run-up to new year's eve, so I think it would be reasonable for the Government to produce a road map, if you like, a plan of what they think may well be anticipated in terms of further restrictions post-Christmas so people know where we stand.
"We've still got confusion at the moment."
Professor Mike Tildesley has urged people to be cautious with any gatherings during the festive season.
The Sage member told Sky News: "It's a really difficult time of year, of course, as a modeller you always say if you're going to introduce restrictions then, of course, the sooner you introduce it, the more effective any of those restrictions are going to be.
"But of course at this time of year it's really challenging, because given what happened last year, the very late introduction of restrictions a few days before Christmas, I think that's quite damaging for people's mental health and wellbeing, so I suspect there's one eye on that, one eye on allowing families to be together, but of course we do need to remember the Omicron variant has not yet gone away."
Receive newsletters with the latest news, sport and what's on updates from the Liverpool ECHO by signing up here
