UK coronavirus live: England at limit of lockdown easing, says Whitty; official UK death toll passes 46,000 – as it happened
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- English beaches packed despite social distancing plea
- Putting brakes on easing English lockdown may not be enough'
- Why has easing of the lockdown in England been delayed?
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Though an effective way to stop the spread of the virus once it has got out of hand, the government's whack-a-mole approach to the northern lockdown represents a failure on a massive scale, writes Devi Sridhar, a professor and chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh.
To fix this, the government needs to look six to eight months ahead. Lockdowns should be a last-resort measure when the frontline outbreak responders - the local testing and tracing teams - can no longer suppress the infection sufficiently.
There are tough decisions ahead. In the absence of a vaccine, people must realise that they cannot have it all. We can either have our daily lives back with borders largely closed, or we can have free movement and constant outbreaks. It's important when weighing this up to realise that the biggest problem for the economy is not lockdown. It is the virus itself.
Related: The northern lockdown represents government failure. There is a better way | Devi Sridhar
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