England's deputy chief medical officer has warned that people will need to manage the risks of Covid in the "long term" - as experts wait to see how long vaccines give protection for.
Prof Jonathan Van Tam urged people to "be cautious" during this afternoon's press briefing from Downing Street.
He said that work is still ongoing to determine how much more transmissible the Indian coronavirus variant is, and admitted scientists still do not know how long vaccines will protect people from the virus for.
Prof Van Tam urged people to try and meet "in smaller numbers" and "take it steady" after rules were further relaxed earlier this week.
The government will announce on June 14 whether all Covid rules will be lifted a week later, Health Secretary Matt Hancock stated.
Prof Van Tam said: ’The government has given people the freedoms to make those judgments for themselves and I understand people can’t live for years and years on end with rules.
"People will have to learn to manage these risks from Covid… because this is not going to go away in the short term, the medium term and probably the long term."
When asked if he would advise people in areas such as Bolton - which has the highest infection rate in England - against taking advantage of new freedoms, he said: "I would advise the residents in those areas to think very carefully about the freedoms they have, weigh up the risks and be very cautious.
"It is possible to do something outside, better to do it outside. If it is possible to do something with smaller numbers, with people you know rather than multiple new contacts, it's better to do that. Take it steady."
Asked by a member of the public how long vaccine protection will last, he stated: "The short answer is we don't yet know."
He said antibodies after infection appear to last for at least six months, but said experts would be watching "closely" for signs that fully-vaccinated people were contracting the virus.
But he said that protection may last "quite some time" in young people, as long as new variants do not scupper that.
He described fighting the spread of the Indian variant of coronavirus as a "straight race" between the transmissibility of the virus and the vaccine rollout.
Prof Van Tam said: "I pitch this personally as a straight race between the transmissibility of this new variant... and vaccine delivery.
"The NHS is doing everything it can to turbo-boost that, and that is the challenge that's ahead of us in the next two to three to four weeks, to make sure that we outrun the virus through really vigorous pull-through on vaccine delivery."
