Boris Johnson is to meet with his cabinet to consider whether new measures are necessary to control sky-high coronavirus case rates as the omicron variant wreaks havoc with essential services across the country.
MPs are set to return to the house of commons this Wednesday, and the Liverpool Echo and the Mirror report that Johnson will chair a meeting of his cabinet the same day to pour over the latest Covid data. Now, the Metro has reported that Johnson is to hold a televised press briefing at 5pm today, though this is yet to be confirmed.
Case rates are the highest they've ever been, and hospitalisations are rising - though they are still some way below the peak seen this time last year. However, the case rates themselves can cause big problems, with swathes of essential workers - from train and bus drivers to supermarket workers and NHS staff - needing to isolate.
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Johnson and Sajid Javid, the health secretary, have so far maintained that further measures beyond plan B are not necessary as omicron appears to cause less severe disease than previous variants. Even if that changes, however, and further restrictions are needed, Johnson may struggle to bring them in: around 100 of his own MPs rebelled when plan B was voted on in December, and many of those MPs remain unhappy with Johnson's leadership. Amid rumours of rivals jostling for position for any potential leadership election, the prime minister likely wants to avoid annoying his MPs further by seeking to introduce more restrictions.
Plan B involves advising people to work from home, ordering masks on public transport and shops, and requiring the NHS Covid pass to enter nightclubs and mass events such as football matches. Further restrictions reported to be under consideration before Christmas include reinstating the rule of six for indoor socialising, including in hospitality.
Infectious diseases expert Professor Neil Ferguson today said he believed cases in the capital may have levelled out.
"I'm cautiously optimistic that infection rates in London in that key 18-50 age group, which has been driving the omicron epidemic, may possibly have plateaued,” he told the BBC. “It's too early to say whether they're going down yet.
“With an epidemic which has been spreading so quickly and reaching such high numbers, it can't sustain those numbers forever. So we would expect to see case numbers start to come down in the next week, maybe already coming down in London, but in other regions a week to three weeks.
“Whether they then drop precipitously or we see a pattern a bit like we saw with delta back in July - of an initial drop and then quite a high plateau - remains to be seen."
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