Media playback is unsupported in your machine Media captionDominic Raab: "We're transitioning from degree 4 to
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The international secretary has defended the federal government easing of lockdown measures in England from Monday, regardless of the nation’s Covid-19 alert system indicating excessive ranges of transmission.
Dominic Raab mentioned England is “transitioning” from degree 4, when there ought to be enforced social distancing measures, to degree three, once they can begin to be relaxed.
He mentioned the strategy is “cautious”.
Scientists who advise ministers have voiced issues about easing the principles.
Mr Raab advised the BBC’s Andrew Marr Present that the federal government had “taken proof from scientists” and has met the 5 checks it mentioned had been wanted to loosen up restrictions.
“As a result of we’ve got made that progress, steadily, slowly, absolutely, week in, week out, we are able to very steadily, very rigorously, take the steps that we’re taking tomorrow,” he mentioned.
He didn’t specify when England would transfer to degree three, saying this is able to be “determined independently by specialists”.
The federal government would be capable to implement “focused” measures in areas that noticed an “uptick” in instances, he added.
Prof Peter Openshaw, who’s a part of a physique that advises the federal government on respiratory viruses, advised the programme that ministers should proceed with “nice, nice care”.
Requested whether or not the federal government is continuing too rapidly, he mentioned there may be “a reasonably unanimous message now that we have to take this slowly and go step-by-step”.
“We have to consider the impact of every step earlier than we transfer to the following one,” he mentioned.
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