Prime Minister Boris Johnson believes a second wave of coronavirus has already arrived in the UK, after scientists reported the “widespread growth” of the virus across the country.
The R number represents the number of infected people one person will pass the virus to, and STV reports that the Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) said the R number has risen to between 1.1 and 1.4, meaning cases could rise very quickly.
Speaking at a visit to the Vaccines Manufacturing Innovation Centre construction site near Oxford on Friday, Mr Johnson said: "There’s no question, as I’ve said for several weeks now, that we could expect [and] are now seeing a second wave coming in.”
He added, “we are seeing it in France, in Spain, across Europe – it has been absolutely, I’m afraid, inevitable we were going to see it in this country.”
Boris Johnson said he didn't want a second full scale national lockdown but reiterated the importance of following the new 'rule of six'. This is more strict in Scotland - where no more than two households can meet at any one time, with a maximum number of six adults in total. In England, six people from six different households can meet up.
He also said: “but as we look at this particular curve and what is happening now, clearly we are going to keep everything under review. I don’t want to get into a second national lockdown at all, it is the last thing anybody wants,” he said.
“I don’t want to go into bigger lockdown measures at all, we want to keep schools open and it is fantastic the schools have gone back in the way they have. We want to keep the economy open as far as we possibly can, we want to keep businesses going.
“The only way we can do that is obviously if people follow the guidance.”
On Friday, Nicola Sturgeon warned that tough news was on the way, saying that “hard but necessary decisions” will likely have to be made in the coming days to head off surging cases of coronavirus.In her daily briefing, the First Minister said: “we need to act to interrupt this growth - no-one wants to see another full scale lockdown."
“If we want to avoid another full-scale lockdown, doing nothing certainly is not an option.
Nicola Sturgeon also said that this weekend will be 'critical' in terms of any potential further COVID-19 measures.
“The coming days are likely to see some hard and necessary decisions - take this as an advance notice", she said.
