Hug hiatus to last till cases fall even more

FAMILIES will have to wait until coronavirus infection rates are even lower before they can hug their relatives again, government scientists warned last night.

Ministers are considering the easing of social-distancing rules next month to allow close contact between family and friends.

But at a Downing Street press conference, England’s chief medical officer Professor Chris Whitty said coronavirus rates are currently still too high. ‘The number of people who actually have the virus at the moment is about one in 370 so we really want to get those rates down further before we start to feel that society as a whole has a low level of Covid,’ he replied when asked when hugging could resume.

UK chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance said he expected regular hand washing and the recommendation for people to stay home from work if they feel ill to become ‘baselines’ of social distancing in the future. ‘On social distancing, I think one has to understand what that might mean longer term,’ he told reporters.

‘And it probably means things like hand hygiene and the fact people will take time off if they get ill and stay at home rather than going into work, testing to know if you’ve got it or not. Those sorts of things are likely to be important baseline measures going forward.’

A review commissioned by the Prime Minister is looking into how and when social-distancing rules can be eased. The Government has said it intends to update the advice on interactions between friends and family, including hugging, by May 17.

In an update published last night, officials said the review is ‘exploring whether existing rules, designed to limit virus transmission could be relaxed in different settings’. The Government has said that socalled vaccine passports may be used to enable the changes to social distancing.