COVID cases could hit 100,000 a day, Health Secretary Sajid Javid has warned – but he confirmed England will not yet move to the government’s plan B for dealing with pressures on hospitals this winter.
Speaking at a Downing Street news conference on Wednesday, Mr Javid cautioned that the coronavirus pandemic “is not over”.
“Thanks to the vaccination programme, the link between hospitalisations and deaths has significantly weakened, but it’s not broken,” the health secretary said.
“So we must all remember that this virus will be with us for the long term and remains a threat to our loved ones, and a threat to the progress that we’ve made in getting our nation closer to normal life.”
Image: The health secretary urged people to get COVID booster jabs
On Wednesday, the UK recorded 49,139 new COVID-19 cases – the eighth day in a row that infections have been above 40,000 – and 179 deaths within 28 days of a positive test.
Mr Javid said that current COVID deaths “remain mercifully low” – an assertion later questioned by one SAGE scientist – and the health secretary added he does not believe the current pressures on the NHS are “unsustainable”.
Mr Javid previously warned of coronavirus cases reaching 100,000 a day this summer ahead of COVID restrictions being lifted on “freedom day”.
Although cases did later rise to a summer peak of around 60,000 in one day in mid-July, they subsequently began to fall.
However, a recent rise in cases has led to calls for ministers to enact plan B of their autumn and winter COVID response strategy.
Under the government’s plan B, contingency measures could include the reintroduction of a legal requirement to wear face coverings in some settings; the potential introduction of COVID vaccine passports; and the possible return of the work from home command.
But Mr Javid said he would not yet be reintroducing COVID measures in England.
“We’re looking closely at the data and we won’t be implementing our plan B of contingency measures at this point,” he told the news conference.
“But we’ll be staying vigilant, preparing for all eventualities, while strengthening our vital defences that can help us fight back against this virus.”
The health secretary also urged people to take “little steps” that would make a “big difference”.
These include meeting others outdoors where possible, ensuring good ventilation, voulntarily wearing masks in crowded spaces and taking lateral flow tests.
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‘Landmark’ antiviral deals announced
“We’ve come so far thanks to the efforts of so many, but with winter ahead, we can’t blow it now,” Mr Javid said.
He also appeared to link the possible reintroduction of COVID measures this winter to the success of the booster jabs programme in the coming weeks.
The health secretary said that getting a top-up vaccination – which are being made available to the most vulnerable and over-50s – was “not just to save lives, but to keep your freedoms too”.
“Because all of these precious moments that we’ve been able to restore over the past few months – the loved ones we’ve been able to see and the collective experiences we’ve been able to share – they’ve been possible thanks to our vaccination programme and because so many of you came forward when it was your time,” he added.
“If we want to secure these freedoms for the long-term than the best thing we can do is come forward once again when that moment comes.
“After the decisive steps that we’ve taken this year, none of us want to go backwards now.”
Urging people to get vaccinated against both COVID and flu, Mr Javid said: “If we all play our part, then we can give ourselves the best possible chance in this race, get through this winter, and enjoy Christmas with our loved ones.”
Professor Stephen Powis, the national medical director of NHS England, said the health service was “very, very busy indeed” but added there was no one number of COVID admissions to hospitals that would trigger fresh interventions.
“What’s happening in one part of the country might not be happening in another part of the country,” he told the news conference.
“That’s been typical of the pandemic over the last 18 months and it’s possible that we will see that variation again.”
Dr Jenny Harries, the chief executive of the UK Health Security Agency, said the country was going into winter with a “really high level” of COVID cases.
“What we can see is that the cases now are almost as high as they were in July and actually not far off where they were last winter,” she said.
“What we are not seeing is that dip down again at the other side of the peak and that is really important because we are kicking off the winter at a really high level of cases.
“Fortunately that is not currently working through into serious disease and deaths.”
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Sajid Javid is asked why Tory MPs were not wearing face masks during Prime Minister’s Questions
The antiviral drugs, if approved by the medicines regulator, are expected to be given to those most at risk from the virus, helping to reduce the severity of symptoms and ease pressure on the NHS.
Amid mounting concern about rising cases, Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation which represents health bodies, has warned the country risks “stumbling into a winter crisis”.
And he has called on the government to enact “Plan B” of its strategy for coping with autumn and winter pressures on hospitals “without delay”.
Mr Taylor also called for a “plan C” to be outlined to health leaders, should the measures in Plan B prove to be “insufficient”.
Labour’s shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth accused Mr Javid of “complacency” at the Downing Street news conference.
“The so-called wall of defence against Covid is crumbling and today we needed a plan to rebuild it,” he said.
Responding to Mr Javid’s assertion that current COVID deaths “remain mercifully low”, SAGE member Professor Susan Michie posted on Twitter: “What kind of mercy is this?”
Tulip Siddiq has told Sky News her “lawyers are ready” to handle any formal questions about allegations she is involved in corruption in Bangladesh.
Asked whether she regrets apparent links with the Bangladeshi Awami League political party, Ms Siddiq said “why don’t you look at my legal letter and see if I have any questions to answer… [the Bangladeshi authorities] have not once contacted me and I’m waiting to hear from them”.
Lawyers acting for Ms Siddiq wrote to the Bangladeshi Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) several weeks ago saying the allegations were “false and vexatious”.
The letter said the ACC must put questions to Ms Siddiq “by no later than 25 March 2025” or “we shall presume that there are no legitimate questions to answer”.
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Staff from the NCA visited Bangladesh as part of initial work to support the interim government in the country.
In a post online today, the former minister said the deadline had expired and the authorities had not replied.
Sky News has approached the Bangladeshi government for comment.
The allegations against Ms Siddiq are focused on links to her aunt Sheikh Hasina – who served as the prime minister of Bangladesh for 20 years.
She is accused of becoming an autocrat, with politically-motivated arrests, extra-judicial killings and other abuses allegedly happening on her watch. Hasina claims it’s all a political witch hunt.
Ms Siddiq was found to have lived in several London properties that had links back to the Awami League political party that her aunt still leads.
She referred herself to the prime minister’s standards adviser Sir Laurie Magnus who said he had “not identified evidence of improprieties” but added it was “regrettable” Ms Siddiq had not been more alert to the “potential reputational risks” of the ties to her aunt.
Ms Siddiq said continuing in her role would be “a distraction” for the government but insisted she had done nothing wrong.
Cryptocurrency exchange OKX reportedly hired former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to advise it over the federal probe that resulted in the firm pleading guilty to several violations and agreeing to pay $505 million in fines and penalties.
Cuomo, a New York-registered attorney, advised OKX on legal issues stemming from the probe sometime after August 2021 when he resigned as New York overnor, Bloomberg reported on April 2, citing people familiar with the matter.
“He spoke with company executives regularly and counseled them on how to respond to the criminal investigation,” Bloomberg said.
The Seychelles-based firm pled guilty to operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business in violation of US Anti-Money Laundering laws on Feb. 24 and agreed to pay $84 million worth of penalties while forfeiting $421 million worth of fees earned from mostly institutional clients.
The breaches occurred from 2018 to 2024 despite OKX having an official policy preventing US persons from transacting on its crypto exchange since 2017, the Department of Justice noted at the time.
A spokesperson for Cuomo, Rich Azzopardi, told Bloomberg that Cuomo has been providing private legal services representing individuals and corporations on a variety of matters since resigning as New York governor.
“He has not represented clients before a New York city or state agency and routinely recommends former colleagues for positions,” Azzopardi added.
OKX reportedly wasn’t willing to comment on its relationships with outside firms.
Cuomo also influenced OKX to make executive appointments: Bloomberg
Cuomo, who is now running for mayor of New York City, also advised OKX to appoint his friend US Attorney Linda Lacewell to OKX’s board of directors, Bloomberg said.
Lacewell, a former superintendent of the New York Department of Financial Services, was added to the board in 2024 and was named OKX’s new chief legal officer on April 1, according to a recent company statement.
After the investigation concluded, OKX said it would seek out a compliance consultant to remedy the issues stemming from the federal probe and bolster its regulatory compliance program.
“Our vision is to make OKX the gold standard of global compliance at scale across different markets and their respective regulatory bodies,”OKX CEO Star Xu said in a Feb. 24 X post.
United States President Donald Trump signed an executive order establishing reciprocal tariffs on trading partners and a 10% baseline tariff on all imports from all countries.
The reciprocal levies on will be approximately half of what trading partners charge for US imports, Trump said. For example, China currently has a tariff of 67% on US imports, so US reciprocal tariffs on Chinese goods will be 34%. Trump also announced a standard 25% tariff on all automobile imports.
Trump told the media that tariffs would return the country to economic prosperity seen in previous centuries:
“From 1789 to 1913, we were a tariff-backed nation. The United States was proportionately the wealthiest it has ever been. So wealthy, in fact, that in the 1880s, they established a commission to decide what they were going to do with the vast sums of money they were collecting.”
“Then, in 1913, for reasons unknown to mankind, they established the income tax so that citizens, rather than foreign countries, would start paying,” Trump said.
Full breakdown of reciprocal tariffs by country. Source: Cointelegraph
Trump presented the tariffs through the lens of economic protectionism and hinted at returning to the economic policies of the 19th century by using them to replace the income tax.
Trump proposes eliminating federal income tax and replacing it with tariff revenue
Trump proposed the idea of abolishing the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and funding the federal government exclusively through trade tariffs while still on the campaign trail in October 2024.
US President Donald Trump addresses the media about reciprocal trade tariffs at the April 2 press event. Source: Fox 4 Dallas
The higher range of the tax savings estimate will only occur if other wage-based taxes are eliminated at the state and municipal levels.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who assumed office in February, also voiced support for replacing the IRS with the “External Revenue Service.”
Lutnick said that the US government cannot balance a budget yet consistently demands more from its citizens every year. Tariffs will also protect American workers and strengthen the US economy, he said.