Keeping the virus out. instead. that is our goal - to live with this virus, not to live in fear of it. globally, international travel has returned in a form. there are still some restrictions, prices are high, and tests have to be done. and the who continues to question travel bans as an idea. and, while the uk briefly introduced some of them for omicron, it quickly changed tack. now that there is community transmission of omicron in the uk, and omicron has spread so widely across the world, the travel red list is now less effective in slowing the incursion of omicron from abroad. 2021 taught us that travel restrictions may buy a little time, but more transmissible variants will find a way through. and so, here we are at the end of 2021 variants spreading, unresolved disagreements over vaccine distribution, over restrictions, over travel bans and the statistics tell their own story. more people have died in 2021 from covid than in 2020.
The question, then, is what to do about this? and bringing in new restrictions remains a live issue. in the house of commons this week, a significant number of borisjohnson s own tory mps voted against new restrictions. one of them was andrea leadsom. covid will be with us - for many years to come, and it s unthinkable that- every autumn from now on, we will be limiting the qualityi of life for all citizens just to be on the safe side. these restrictions were voted through, and polling in the uk and elsewhere suggests public opinion remains behind them. but, as covid becomes ever more long term, opposition to restrictions becomes more pronounced. and one of the most contentious restrictions of them all this year has been travel bans. at the start of 2021, there were heavy restrictions. international travel was down 49%, compared with 2019. in addition, countries like australia and new zealand effectively sealed themselves off they wanted to suppress the virus. but in the end, delta m
Consequences in india. my colleague yogita limaye described the situation. every crematorium we ve been to, we ve seen body after body being brought in. it s hard for anyone to keep count, but what workers have been telling me is that the real scale of deaths caused by covid i9 in india is a lot higher than what official numbers reflect. the threat of variants was real and their threat was being explicitly connected to vaccination rates. this is the co creator of the astrazeneca vaccine. we need to be able to find the funds and the means to vaccinate widely across the world. if we don t, what will happen is more mutations arising in the virus, and we will have a harder and harder task to fight the virus as it continues to mutate. through the year, the richer countries pushed on with their vaccine roll outs. nearly 70% of the uk population has been double jabbed. but less than half of the overall global population has been.
And omicron has also taught us other ways the pandemic has evolved. for one, just like the scientists said they would, variants have arrived. alpha, beta, and delta drove covid infections globally with devastating consequences in india. my colleague yogita limaye described the situation. every crematorium we ve been to, we ve seen body after body being brought in. it s hard for anyone to keep count, but what workers have been telling me is that the real scale of deaths caused by covid i9 in india is a lot higher than what official numbers reflect. the threat of variants was real and their threat was being explicitly connected to vaccination rates. this is the co creator of the astrazeneca vaccine. we need to be able to find the funds and the means to vaccinate widely across the world. if we don t, what will happen is more mutations arising in the virus, and we will have a harder and harder task to fight the virus as it continues to mutate. through the year,
And the number of hospitalizations will continue to increase in the next two weeks. and that is weighing on our hospitals, which are already very mobilised. the question, then, is what to do about this? and bringing in new restrictions remains a live issue. in the house of commons this week, a significant number of borisjohnson s own tory mps voted against new restrictions. one of them was andrea leadsom. covid will be with us - for many years to come, and it s unthinkable to think that every autumn from now on, - we will be limiting the qualityl of life for all citizens just to be on the safe side. these restrictions were voted through, and polling in the uk and elsewhere suggests public opinion remains behind them. but, as covid becomes ever more long term, opposition to restrictions becomes more pronounced. and one of the most contentious restrictions of them all this year has been travel bans. at the start of 2021, there were heavy restrictions. international travel was down 49%, c