Dominic Raab is leading today’s daily coronavirus press conference
The foreign secretary begins by announcing 559,935 people have been tested for the virus in the UK, and of those people 133,495 have tested positive.
And 18,100 UK hospital patients have sadly died, he says.
Raab says the government has worked to “take the right steps at the right times” but he knows it’s been tough for communities, businesses and families.
There’s been an “immense mental strain” for people in terms of finances and isolation.
“We are making progress through the peak of this virus – but we’re not out of the woods yet.”
He says lockdown must remain “for the time being” because otherwise there could be a second spike in the virus and a second lockdown.
PPE for NHS staff
The crisis has “shone a light on the best amongst us”, Raab says, such as the weekly clap for carers events.
With Sir Nick Carter, chief of defence staff, he says he should point out the massive effort of the armed forces in building Nightingale hospitals and delivering PPE.
As a result that means “the peak of this virus has not overwhelmed the NHS”.
Sir Nick says the delegation of armed forces personnel makes them much more flexible and able to adapt to local needs.
He says their help for the NHS to provide personal protective equipment (PPE) has been “the single greatest logistical challenge I have come across”.
And the forces are involved in testing, designing the systems and staffing some of the test centres.
And they’ve been helping quash misinformation.
Vaccines
Raab and Prof Whitty gives another straight forward warning to people not to expect a vaccine any time soon.
“A vaccine is not going to come in any time particularly soon to allow us to ease out of the current social distancing measures into a transition” the foreign secretary.
England’s chief medical officer says in the long run the exit from lockdown will be either a vaccine and/ or highly effective drugs so that people stop dying of the disease.
The probability of having those by the end of the year are “incredibly small” he says.
“We’ll have to rely on social measures – it’s going to take a long time.”
Virus Peak
Peak likely to be happening across the whole UK, Whitty says
England’s chief medical officer is asked if the “peak” has been reached across the UK, including in places like Bristol and the south west where numbers have not been as high.
Prof Whitty said the actual peak is an artificial not a natural because of the lockdown, so it is “likely to occur at really a very similar time”.
There could be a “slightly earlier effect in London” but much less than there would have been otherwise.
