It comes as ministers prepare contingency plans to extend restrictions beyond June 21, amid fears that a surge in infections of the Indian variant could lead to a spike in deaths.
Public Health England analysis shows only 177 out of 5,599 people who caught the mutant strain and presented to A&E had already had both jabs. Almost 3,400 had not yet had their first dose.
Chief Executive of the Shepherd Neame brewery and pub company in Kent Jonathan Neame (pictured) said a week would leave a marginal impact but five weeks would be a real damper .
Last modified on Fri 28 May 2021 12.20 EDT
The Cambridge professor whose argument against a herd immunity strategy helped trigger England’s first lockdown has voiced concerns about the risks of easing restrictions next month.
Prof Sir Tim Gowers sent Dominic Cummings a five-page document warning of the need to “move urgently to extreme containment measures” in March last year. Boris Johnson’s former chief aide told MPs this week it had influenced a critical change in the government’s early thinking, with lockdown announced two days later.
In an interview with the Guardian, Gowers said “things will get bad very, very quickly” after 21 June – the fourth and final lockdown-lifting step – if the government had misjudged factors such as the spread of new Covid variants.