Prime Minister Boris Johnson warns that easing lockdown will ‘inevitably’ lead to more Covid deaths

Boris Johnson has urged people to continue to “exercise restraint” after the latest round of the Government’s coronavirus restrictions were eased in England on Monday, April 12.

On the back of this, the Prime Minister has also warned that easing restrictions will “inevitably” lead to more infections and deaths.

Mr Johnson said that although vaccines had helped, lockdown restrictions had done “the bulk of the work” in reducing Covid-19 infections.

It comes as the NHS moved to “Phase 2" of the vaccination programme on Tuesday, April 13 which involves offering vaccines to healthy adults aged under 50.

Speaking in Downing Street, Mr Johnson said: “It’s great that we have managed to achieve the target of getting everyone in the one to nine (priority) groups vaccinated by the deadline, by the timetable – a little bit ahead actually, 32 million people now have got their first dose, which is terrific.

“We are going now to the 45-49 group, they are being asked to come forward.

“Of course the vaccination programme has helped, but the bulk of the work in reducing the disease has been done by the lockdown.

“So, as we unlock, the result will inevitably be that we will see more infection, sadly we will see more hospitalisation and deaths.

“People have just got to understand that.”

The Prime Minister insisted that there were no plans at the present moment to change the road map out of lockdown, with the key dates for the further easing of measures still fixed on May 17 and June 21.

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