Experts say UK must learn to live with coronavirus as professors predict worst is over
A leading professor has said that mass deaths are now “history”, as the UK is learn to live with the virus.
It comes as the Prime Minister refused to impose new restrictions before the new year, setting his pandemic policy apart from other nations across Europe.
Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, said that the prime minister’s judgment was “probably fine” because the worst of Covid-19 was over.
Johnson announced that the data showed that heavier restrictions were not needed at this time and that whilst there were a record numbers of cases, it was not necessary to lock the country down or close industries, such as hospitality.
The figures showed that a record 112,628 coronavirus cases were confirmed on Christmas Day in England, but the government remains optimistic that hospitals will not be overwhelmed by Omicron.
Paul Hunter, a professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, told BBC Breakfast: “Covid is only one virus of a family of coronaviruses, and the other coronaviruses throw off new variants typically every year or so, and that’s almost certainly what’s going to happen with Covid — it will become effectively just another cause of the common cold.”
Hunter emphasised that decision makers need to think about self-isolation rules as it becomes clear that the disease will “not be going away”.