Britain could bring in curfews and movement restrictions within days – Johnson

While Britain’s death toll from the coronavirus has reached 281, with the youngest victim aged 18 and the oldest 102, the British prime minister warned that if people continued to congregate in parks and markets, his government would consider tougher measures to enforce social distancing.

The UK could face close to a year of social distancing measures to safeguard the NHS’s ability to cope with coronavirus, according to newly published scientific advice to ministers.

“I don’t think you need to use your imagination very much to see where we might have to go, and we will think about this very actively in the next 24 hours,” the PM told reporters in Downing Street on Sunday.

“We need to think about the kinds of measures that we’ve seen elsewhere, other countries that have been forced to bring in restrictions on people’s movements altogether.”

Despite having recently ruled out restricting travel in and out of London or introducing the kind of lockdown imposed in parts of France, Spain and Italy, Johnson said on Sunday that he would consider introducing such measures at the moment they can have the maximum effect.

“At the moment when the epidemic is hardly spreading at all, that’s not the moment to impose curfews and prohibitions on movement and so on and so forth. You’ve got to wait until, alas, it’s the right moment to do it,” he said.

His warning about social distancing came as the National Health Service told 1.5 million people with specific medical conditions that make them vulnerable to the virus to stay in their homes for the next 12 weeks.

Among those affected are people undergoing chemotherapy or radical radiotherapy for lung cancer and those with cancers of the blood or bone marrow; people having immunotherapy or other continuing antibody treatments for cancer; those on immunosuppressive drugs; people with respiratory conditions including severe asthma, COPD and cystic fibrosis; and pregnant women with significant heart disease.

Communities secretary Robert Jenrick said the government would arrange for food and medicine to be delivered to their homes while they remain in isolation.

“I don’t underestimate what we’re asking of people. It will be tough. But if you are one of these people I want to assure these people on behalf of the government that you are not alone,” he said.