Health Secretary Matt Hancock has said the UK will not lift the lockdown until it’s safe to do so. Hancock said:”We can’t let up in our efforts, we can’t give up the hard work that’s been done up to now. This shared sacrifice, and I know it is a sacrifice, is beginning to work but we’re not going to lift these measures until it’s safe to do so.”
Families with loved ones dying with the coronavirus should be allowed to say a final goodbye to their relatives “wherever possible”, the health secretary has said.
Matt Hancock announced new procedures so that “wherever possible” people will be given the “chance to say goodbye” to loved ones dying with COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.
He said “wanting to be with someone you love at the end of their life is one of the deepest human instincts”, adding that he wept at reports of a 13-year-old body called Ismail dying without a parent at his bedside.
“I’m pleased to say that working with Public Health England, the care sector and many others, we are introducing new procedures so we can limit the risk of infection while wherever possible giving people’s closest loved ones the chance to say goodbye,” Mr Hancock said.
Politicians are under pressure to reveal how long the UK lockdown will be extended for
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, who has been deputising for Boris Johnson while he recovers at Chequers, has warned that it is still too soon for ministers to begin lifting the strict social distancing rules introduced last month.
“We don’t expect to make any changes to measures at that point, and we won’t until we are confident, as confident as we can be, that changes can be safely made,” he said.
This news comes after the newly elected Labour leader, Sir Kier Starmer, has said that his party would back the move but has said that “there needs to be transparency” in order to maintain public trust.
First Minister of Northern Ireland, Arlene Foster has said that Northern Ireland’s coronavirus lockdown is to be extended until 9 May.
Michelle O’Neill, Deputy First Minister for NI, has said that now was the time to “dig in, to stay strong and save lives”.
The UK has now surpassed 100,000 cases of infection of COVID-19, with 103,093 people having contracted the disease, there has also been a reported number of 13,729 death due to the coronavirus in the country.
