you know, a year ago, two years ago, the answer seemed more clear and, you know, we did shut down and we did close schools and we did do all of those things, but covid hasn t gone anywhere. it s still here and it s and it seems to be here to stay, at least for the near future. i don t know that shutting down is the answer, but i do know that we, we do have other solutions that are out there. we know that vaccines work. and we know that the boosters are effective. you know, it s about people. and the people that we are seeing getting severely ill and dying, the majority of those people are not vaccinated. how does the current situation you re facing compare to what it was like for you to go to work two years ago?
floating another four or five names to make it clear that the pool is just bigger than those three possibilities. so i think the president, you know, he s got some excellent people to choose from, i think whoever he goes with will do well. it is just how does this person hold up in extraordinary scrutiny they will face over the next month or two, from the press, from republicans, from the rest of the country? thank you. it is historic because it will be the first black woman on the supreme court. it didn t actually change the political makeup of the supreme court though. still ahead, covid hasn t stopped sarah palin from going out in new york city and the mayor s office not particularly happy about it. and the irs goes high-tech. some taxpayers will need more than a user name and password to access their accounts. those stories and a rather depressing weather forecast when way too early comes back. s anr depressing weather forecast when
in northern ireland, all the remaining legal covid regulations are being lifted from today they become guidance only. stormont ministers say the omicron variant isn t putting significant pressure on hospitals though they ve warned that covid hasn t gone away. our ireland correspondent, chris page, joins me from stormont. yes, this is something of a landmark day in northern ireland after almost two years of legal regulations while the covid rules are gone from the law. the political leaders at stormont and medics have warned it does not mean coronavirus has gone away and that people should still take sensible precautions. let me talk you through what has changed. from today, it is no longer a legal requirement for people to wear face coverings. previously it had been
the town was dead. business wasn t as good as obviously it used to be. but, yeah, i m happy that it s coming back to normal. the prime minister has announced a change in the rules which means as of thursday you will no longer need to isolate by law if you test positive for covid. but some people like sarah say they still will. i probably would because of my business. so i wouldn t want to be. and i can work from home with what i do, i can have people working in the shop whilst i work from home. after two years of restrictions, many people feel it s the right time for them to be lifted, but we re being urged to remember that covid hasn t gone away. this is good. we can return more to normal. however, think about other people. think about keeping other people safe. there are a lot of people in the community who are very worried about the lifting of restrictions.
best numbers we have on infections because they tell us about how many people are getting infected and not people are getting infected and not people who are forgetting to enter the natural flow data into the system which not everybody does. natural flow test data. we can show to the audience that they are really moving in the right direction. coming down from the peak at christmas and now they really are moving in the right direction. still far higher than they were in november, so we are still, as i said, covid hasn t gone away, but a couple of weeks ago this was the only data where the trends were not moving in the right direction but now we can say all the data is pointing downwards which is how we wanted to go. the pointing downwards which is how we wanted to go- wanted to go. the government has made it clear wanted to go. the government has made it clear and wanted to go. the government has made it clear and the wanted to go. the government has made it clear and the sci