British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday that he would end all restrictions on coronaviruses in England, drawing skepticism from some scientists and political opponents.
The plan by Johnson to live with carbon dioxide has sparked alarm that it is premature and will leave the country vulnerable to new viral variants, but the government says it has provided more testing than most other countries.
Many Conservative Party lawmakers want the remaining legal restrictions to be removed so they can take control of the government. Critics think the plan is to distract attention from the scandals.
The seventh-highest death toll in the world has been reported by Britain.
As Hong Kong builds isolation units and Europe retains vaccine rules, Johnson wants the public to take responsibility and repeal any requirement that restricts personal freedom.
The government will offer extra booster doses to the most vulnerable, as well as other pharmaceuticals interventions, in order to encourage the use of booster vaccines.
We don't need to pay the cost of restrictive policies anymore because they pose a heavy toll on our economy, society, mental wellbeing and on the life chances of our children.
Let us learn to live with this virus and not restrict our freedom.
The legal requirement to self-isolate for people who test positive for COVID would be removed on February 24.
The amount of money spent on testing by the devolved administrations of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will be dependent on the decisions made by the UK government.
To allow significant dismantling of the testing infrastructure built up in the last two years would be inexcusable negligent.
Johnson said that there would be a rapid response to new coronaviruses, which could be quickly scaled up.
He cited the weakened link between COVID-19 cases and deaths due to vaccines, antivirals and the Omicron variant as the reason for his decision.
It is only because we know Omicron is less severe that testing for it on a large scale is less important and less valuable.
This cost a lot. We need to scale this back.
Johnson said that they would work with retailers to allow anyone who wants to buy tests to do so.
Britain has been unusual in giving free tests to people who want them for a long time. President Joe Biden offered limited free rapid tests to households last month.
The leader of the opposition Keir Starmer said that the plan to reduce the availability of testing was ill-conceived.
Labour Party leader Starmer saidIgnorance is bliss and is not a responsible approach to a deadly virus.
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