What's the likelihood of restrictions after 26th jan.

[Kca29]

Plan B to stay in place for another 3 weeks as you know. What do you think the chances of more restrictions after that?? Would it be immediate? I guess there would be a few days notice?

It's my 30th birthday the weekend of the 29th. We've all just had covid and I was hoping to book a weekend away (in the U.K.) with Dp and dc. I'd be quite happy just to get away from the daily grind and watch tv in a hotel if it meant a break away 😅

Maybe I won't bother 🤷‍♀️

@Waxonwaxoff0

Latest reports are that free LFTs are going to be scrapped apart from workplaces like hospitals. We are definitely going in the direction of "living with Covid" and moving away from restrictions.

Where did you get that idea? Only this very morning the Health Secretary confirmed that the report in the press that free LFTs are to be stopped is nonsense adding that "the government had ordered 425 million lateral flow devices in January".

Um what? Who said that?

Your irony detector appears to have failed.

@Florianus it was reported yesterday, obviously it has been denied this morning. Although we'll see.

[quote Waxonwaxoff0]@Florianus it was reported yesterday, obviously it has been denied this morning. Although we'll see.[/quote]
It wasn't a report. It was speculation in The Times, who said that a new system could mean that free LFTs could face the axe.

It's a well-known journalistic technique for quiet news days - say what could happen, not what has happened. Try to add verisimilitude by quoting "un-named Whitehall sources".

Covid leaks in The Times have usually been accurate (Times subscriber here).

I think we will continue to see aspects of life restricted by the impacts of Covid - so long waits for hospital treatment, backed up ambulances, low stocks in supermarkets, education affected by sick teachers, reduced bus timetables, cancelled theatre shows etc.

We will also see some aspects of life which don't look normal because people are voluntarily restricting their activities due to Covid or Covid-related uncertainties - emptier high streets, fewer people booking holidays abroad, lower footfall in pubs and restaurants etc.

We will also see some things which were part of pandemic life that will remain, at least for a while - a greater % of people wfh, perhaps less business travel as it is replaced by video-conferencing for some things, perhaps telephone / e-consult type arrangements as first point of contact with GPs.

I don't expect to see more legal restrictions brought in by the Government UNLESS a future variant combines the transmissability and vaccine escape of Omicron with the virulence of Alpha or Delta.

They're mostly going