France, Germany Plan To Begin Another Lockdown, See Major Reason

France and Germany have made plans to begin another lockdown, due to high daily records of coronavirus in the countries.

Almost 100,000 people are contacting coronavirus on daily basics in the European countries, OnyxNews Nigeria quotes BBC reporting that a major analysis has suggested this.

The study, by Imperial College London, says the pace of the epidemic is increasing and estimates the number of people infected is now doubling every nine days.

The authors say we are at a “critical stage” and “something has to change“.

France and Germany have turned to forms of lockdown to control the continuous spread of the virus.

Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick told BBC Breakfast the government wanted to “try to avoid having a national blanket approach” to coronavirus restrictions in England, where a regional three-tier alert system is in place.

“We don’t have a plan, today, to do a full national lockdown,” he said, adding such a move “would be destructive to people’s lives and livelihoods and broader health and wellbeing”.

A national “firebreak” lockdown is ongoing in Wales, while Northern Ireland has tightened restrictions, including closing schools, and Scotland has confirmed details of its new tiered alert system.

Labour’s shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth called for Prime Minister Boris Johnson to hold a news conference to outline “steps he will now take to get control of the virus and save lives“.

Experts are warning that the two countries are fast approaching the peak in infections seen in the spring.

The React-1 study is highly influential because it is the most recent assessment of Covid-19 in the country, with the last swabs taken only on Sunday and nearly 86,000 volunteers taking part.

A further 24,701 new coronavirus cases were reported on Thursday – but the Imperial College study randomly tests asymptomatic people to estimate the number of overall new infections.

While cases are currently highest in northern England, infections are surging more rapidly in southern parts.

The study compared the latest swabs collected between 16 and 25 October with the last round of swabs, between 18 September and 5 October.

It found that, on average, every infected person in London was passing on the virus to nearly three other people – although there is some uncertainty in the figure, it is the highest estimated rate in England.