Coronavirus 'Tier 5': England faces possible new Covid restrictions, source says [View all]

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/dec/29/tier-5-england-faces-possible-new-covid-restrictions-source-says

'Tier 5': England faces possible new Covid restrictions, source says


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Nicola Davis Science correspondent

Tue 29 Dec 2020 12.10 GMTLast modified on Tue 29 Dec 2020 15.11 GMT

Further coronavirus restrictions could be introduced in England akin to a “tier 5” lockdown, a government source has suggested, as experts warn the current curbs might not be enough to shrink the epidemic.

Tier 4 restrictions came into force in London and parts of the south-east and the east of England on 20 December and have since been extended to a swathe of the country, from Cambridgeshire to Sussex and parts of Hampshire.

Under these restrictions, people have been told to stay at home, with household mixing banned outside support bubbles, although one person can meet up with one other person outdoors.
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However, an analysis of the spread of the new, highly transmissible coronavirus variant by experts at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, released this month, warned that even if the whole of England were placed under tier 4 restrictions on Boxing Day until the end of January, the R value would not fall below 1.

Now, it seems, there could be plans to introduce even stricter measures to try to keep the virus under control. According to the Mirror, a Whitehall source has said the tier 4 rules do not appear to be working, adding that the government could introduce “another level on to tier 4, so like a tier 5”.

While no details have been released as to what such a tier could look like, or whether it would even be called “tier 5”, one possibility is that the tighter measures could include closing schools for the majority of pupils and moving education online.
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