London to enter new phase of lockdown, as UK Covid cases surpass 1 million

-

As the United Kingdom passed the grim milestone of one million coronavirus cases, London  is about to enter a second national lockdown in the coming days, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced. 

The month-long shutdown will come into effect from Thursday after a parliamentary vote early next week, Johnson said during a news conference on Saturday evening. "We must act now to contain the autumn surge," he said.

He said that “no responsible prime minister” could ignore the grim figures.

“Unless we act, we could see deaths in this country running at several thousand a day,” said Johnson, who was hospitalized earlier this year for a serious case of Covid-19. 

The strict lockdown will see the closure of pubs, restaurants and non-essential businesses, including hair salons and gyms. Schools, universities and playgrounds will stay open. 

People will only be able to leave their homes for specific reasons: education, work (if they are unable to work from home), to shop for food, for health reasons, or for exercise and recreation outdoors, either with that person's household or with one person from another household.

The UK, which has the biggest official death toll in Europe from COVID-19, is grappling with more than 20,000 new coronavirus cases a day and scientists have warned the “worst case” scenario of 80,000 dead could be exceeded.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chicago Police release footage of officer fatally shooting 13-year-old boy

-
Image
Police Bodycam footage of a 13-year-old boy being shot dead by police in Chicago shows the youth appearing to drop a handgun and raising his hands less than a second before an officer kills him. A still frame taken from Officer Eric Stillman’s body camera footage shows that Adam Toledo was empty handed had his hands up when Officer Stillman shot him once in the chest at about 3am on 29 March. Police, who were responding to reports of shots fired in the area, say the boy had a handgun on him before the shooting. Officer Stillman’s footage shows him shining a light on a handgun on the ground near Adam after he shot him.    The release of the footage and other investigation materials comes at a sensitive time, with the ongoing trial in Minneapolis of former Officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd and the recent police killing of another black man, Daunte Wright, in one of that city’s suburbs. Before the Civilian Office of Police Accountability posted the material on it...
Read more

Israel destroys nature reserve, uproots 10,000 trees

-
Image
The Israeli army destroyed a natural reserve and uprooted at least 10,000 trees in a military campaign in the northern West Bank in a move that Palestinians termed a "crime". Moataz Bisharat, who is responsible for monitoring Israeli settlement activity in the Jordan Valley, told Anadolu Agency that the occupation army pushed military vehicles and dozens of soldiers into the Ainun area in Tubas city in the morning and destroyed a nature reserve built on an area of about 400 dunums (98 acres). The occupation army "chopped down and destroyed about 10,000 forest trees and about 300 olive trees," he said. Trees were planted in the nature reserve eight years ago as part of the Greening Palestine project supervised by the Palestinian Ministry of Agriculture and funded by the Venezuelan consulate in Palestine. Bisharat stressed that the occupation alleged that the destruction of the reserve came as it was classed as a military zone even though it was not more than 300 metr...
Read more

Unrest in South Africa increases fars of food and fuel shortages

-
Image
 Violence and looting has raged in South Africa for the sixth day running, stoking fears of food and fuel shortages as disruption to farming, manufacturing and oil refining began to bite amid the country’s worst unrest in decades. More than 70 people have died as grievances over the jailing of former President Jacob Zuma have widened into an outpouring of anger over the inequality that remains 27 years after the end of apartheid. Poverty has been exacerbated by severe social and economic restrictions aimed at curbing the spread of COVID-19. More than 1,200 people have been arrested in the lawlessness that has raged in poor areas of two provinces, where a community radio station was ransacked and forced off the air on Tuesday and some COVID-19 vaccination centres were closed, disrupting urgently needed inoculations. Many of the deaths in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal provinces occurred in chaotic stampedes as thousands of people stole food, electric appliances, liquor and clothing from ...
Read more