The United Kingdom is moving forward with its reopening plan, allowing for nonessential businesses to open for outdoor service next week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced on Monday.
Beginning April 12, shops, gyms, zoos, campsites, hair salons, and bars and restaurants with outdoor service will be allowed to reopen after a three-month lockdown. Johnson also revealed that every English citizen will receive two at-home rapid tests per week in hopes of making the progress on reopening “irreversible.”
The prime minister touted the U.K.’s testing efforts as integral to its ability to manage outbreaks in the past and going forward, though others criticized the mass-scale approach.
“Mass testing is a scandalous waste of money,” Allyson Pollock, professor of public health at Newcastle University, told the BBC, adding, “When the prevalence rate of coronavirus falls as low as it is at the moment, then an increasing proportion of cases are likely to be false positives, meaning that cases and contacts will self-isolate unnecessarily.”
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The U.K.’s rolling seven-day average of new coronavirus cases was just over 3,800 on Sunday, far down from its peak of nearly 60,000 in January.
“On Monday, April 12, I will be going to the pub myself and cautiously but irreversibly raising a pint of beer to my lips,” Johnson said during Monday’s press conference, pointing to improvements in vaccination rates.
When asked about “vaccine passports,” Johnson specified that the government’s intention is not to push the use of credentials for patronizing businesses but that they will be valuable for travel purposes.
“There is absolutely no question of people being asked to produce certification or COVID status report when they go to the shops or the pub garden or to the hairdressers or whatever on Monday,” he said, adding, “The idea of vaccination status being useful for international travel is something that all countries are looking at. I do think that’s going to be part of the way people deal with it.”
Monday’s announcement came shortly after neighboring France put forth a new series of lockdown measures. President Emmanuel Macron announced on Wednesday that French schools would close for three weeks to deal with elevated hospitalization numbers.
Germany also recently instituted new lockdown measures to respond to rising infections.
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Despite other country’s measures, Johnson was optimistic that England would be able to continue with its reopening road map. Aimed for May 17, pubs, restaurants, cinemas, theaters, museums, and other indoor events, including organized sports, would be permitted within limits. The government has also set a goal of allowing international travel to resume on that date.
