This is the only way to prevent the emergence of more dangerous variants \u2013 and end the pandemic for good<\/p>\n
It\u2019s easy to forget, as pubs reopen and children fill school playgrounds again, what a brutal winter Britain faced. The second wave took more lives than the first, schools remained shut, and a stay-at-home order was enforced across the country during the coldest, darkest months. A more transmissible variant of Covid-19 was identified in Kent just days before Christmas<\/a>, derailing the government\u2019s plans to ease restrictions. Hospitals struggled to cope with a steep rise in ICU admissions, and the mayor of London declared a \u201cmajor incident<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n Fortunately, Britain is now in a far better position. As of this week, more than 60%<\/a> of the adult population has received at least one dose of a vaccine. The number of confirmed Covid-19 cases and ONS estimates of prevalence <\/a>and test positivity all continue to fall week on week. We can look forward to a summer of outdoor lunches and, in the longer term, indoor dinner parties, cinema trips and concert halls. It seems likely that Covid-19 will become a disease we can vaccinate against, much like measles, rubella, diphtheria and pertussis.<\/p>\n