The government has been urged to announce another lockdown to avoid "tens of thousands" of avoidable deaths by a group of independent scientists.
Independent Sage has called on Boris Johnson to introduce a third national lockdown to help prevent the NHS from "collapse", reports the Mirror.
Independent Sage - set up as an alternative to the Government’s own Sage committee of advisers - said tougher restrictions are necessary because Tier 4 rules have shown no sign of controlling the new variant which is up to 70% more transmissible.
The group of scientists have made the announcement as the Prime Minister was holding crisis talks tonight ( Tuesday). Health Secretary Matt Hancock is due to announce any changes to tier areas in a statement to the Commons on Wednesday.
As the group urged Boris Johnson to avoid "doing too little, too late" yet again and act now to prevent a "catastrophe", it said Tier 4 rules aren't enough and claimed schools are unsafe and should remain closed until February.
It also called for the UK to impose "proper" border controls and support the vaccine roll-out to other countries
The UK needs a "radical rethink" because it has entered a "new, more serious pandemic" thanks to the new strain which is expected to be the dominant strain by mid-January, the scientists warned.
Independent Sage said the pandemic in England is "at the most threatening stage of the entire year" and pressures on the NHS will get "significantly worse" in January.
Second wave deaths could soon pass the total from the first wave.
It said more than 27,000 people have died within 28 days of a positive Covid-19 test since September, compared to almost 37,000 from March to August this year.
"There were over 3,000 deaths in the last week alone, reflecting people infected at the beginning of December," a spokesperson said.
Since then, cases have almost tripled and hospital admissions almost doubled.
The spokesperson added: "This means that the number of deaths will, unfortunately, increase and keep increasing for several weeks yet. Deaths from the second wave will probably exceed those in the first wave at some point in January.
"The greater transmissibility of [the new variant] has tipped us into a new, even more serious, pandemic. We are no longer in the same pandemic we were in up to December."
Independent Sage gave a scathing indictment of the Prime Minister's handling of the crisis, saying his failure to impose a circuit-breaker lockdown in September allowed the new variant of Covid-10 to spread widely
It also meant England entered December with a high number of cases, despite the November lockdown, and a high number of people in hospital.
Independent Sage said the current four-tier system in England is "simply not sufficient, even where the new variant is rare".
Even though the new variant isn't thought to cause more severe disease than the standard strain of coronavirus, the fact that it is more infectious will lead to more patients in hospital and deaths, the group warned.
It pointed to London, where the strain is prevalent and there has been a rapid rise in hospital admissions compared with other regions.
London now has by far the highest admission rates in the country, it said.
Independent Sage said Tier 2 and 3 restrictions do not appear to be tough enough to suppress the standard strain, as cases in those areas have been steadily increasing since the beginning of December.
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Sir David King, chair of Independent Sage and former chief scientific adviser to the UK Government, said: "The UK is now at the most precarious stage of the pandemic and urgent action is needed.
"There is every reason to treat this as the critical time for action now. Any delay will probably cause tens of thousands more deaths."
Christina Pagel, professor of operational research at University College London (UCL), said: "Things are as bad as they have ever been. The frightening thing is that they are going to continue to get worse.
"Action is needed now to avoid the collapse of the NHS in a few weeks. It is that serious."
Deenan Pillay, professor of virology at UCL, added: "We urge the government to avoid yet again doing too little, too late to halt the latest surge of this deadly pandemic."
