BORIS Johnson has urged the British public to “keep going” as he made clear the lockdown restrictions would continue as the country neared the end of the first phase of the coronavirus outbreak.
The Prime Minister, making a public statement from the steps of No 10 as he returned to his desk after two weeks recovering from the effects of the virus, said that, thanks to the public’s “sheer grit and guts” in observing the social restrictions, the UK was “beginning to turn the tide” against Covid-19.
However, while he acknowledged the public’s impatience and recognised the need to fire up the engines of the economy, he warned that now was the moment of “maximum risk,” that going too early in lifting the restrictions would risk a “new wave of death and disaster”.
READ MORE: Boris Johnson admitted to hospital over coronavirus symptoms
The PM also drew on his own experience of fighting the disease in the intensive care unit of St Thomas’s Hospital, saying: “If this virus were a physical assailant, an unexpected and invisible mugger - which I can tell you from personal experience, it is - then this is the moment when we have begun together to wrestle it to the floor.
"And so it follows that this is the moment of opportunity, this is the moment when we can press home our advantage, it is also the moment of maximum risk.
"I know there will be many people looking at our apparent success and beginning to wonder whether now is the time to go easy on those social distancing measures."
Acknowledging how hard and stressful the social restrictions were, he nonetheless delivered a blunt message to the country.
“Let me say directly also to British business to the shopkeepers, to the entrepreneurs, to the hospitality sector to everyone on whom our economy depends. I understand your impatience. I share your anxiety.
“And I know that without our private sector, without the drive and commitment of the wealth creators of this country, there will be no economy to speak of, there will be no cash to pay for our public services, no way of funding our NHS, and, yes, I can see the long term consequences of lock down as clearly as anyone, and so, yes, I entirely share your urgency, it’s the Government’s urgency, and yet we must also recognise the risk of a second spike, the risk of losing control of that virus, and letting the reproduction rate go back over one, because that would mean not only a new wave of death and disease but also an economic disaster and we would be forced once again to slam on the brakes across the whole country and the whole economy and reimpose restrictions in such a way as to do more and lasting damage.”
Mr Johnson said the coronavirus was the country’s single biggest challenge since the Second World War and echoed Winston Churchill’s famous phrase about the “beginning of the end”.
“I know it is tough. And I want to get this economy moving as fast as I can but I refuse to throw away all the effort and the sacrifice of the British people and to risk a second major outbreak and huge loss of life and the overwhelming of the NHS.”
READ MORE: Coronavirus: Lockdown could end later in Scotland than England
In another direct message to the public, he said: “I ask you to contain your impatience because I believe we are coming now to the end of the first phase of this conflict and in spite of all the suffering we have so nearly succeeded.
"We defied so many predictions. We did not run out of ventilators or ICU beds. We did not allow our NHS to collapse, and on the contrary we have so far collectively shielded our NHS so that our incredible doctors and nurses and healthcare staff have been able to shield all of us from an outbreak that would have been far worse and we collectively flattened the peak."
The PM added: "And so when we are sure that this first phase is over and that we are meeting our five tests: deaths falling, NHS protected, rate of infection down, really sorting out the challenges of testing and PPE, avoiding a second peak, then that will be the time to move on to the second phase in which we continue to suppress the disease and keep the reproduction rate - the R rate - down, but begin gradually to refine the economic and social restrictions and one-by-one to fire up the engines of this vast UK economy.
"And in that process difficult judgments will be made and we simply cannot spell out now how fast or slow or even when those changes will be made, though clearly the Government will be saying much more about this in the coming days."
With the Government being criticised for what some have called treating the public as children, Mr Johnson pointed to how ministers would be saying much more about the strategy ahead in the coming days and promised “maximum possible transparency”.
He explained: “I want to share all our working and our thinking, my thinking, with you the British people and of course, we will be relying as ever on the science to inform us as we have from the beginning but we will also be reaching out to build the biggest possible consensus across business, across industry, across all parts of our United Kingdom, across party lines, bringing in opposition parties as far as we possibly can because that is no less than what the British people would expect.”
The PM insisted that preparations on dealing with phase two of the pandemic had been underway for weeks.
He added: “We are now on track to prevail in phase one and so I say to you finally if you can keep going in the way that you have kept going so far, if you can help protect our NHS to save lives and if we as a country can show the same spirit of optimism and energy shown by Captain Tom Moore, who turns 100 this week, if we can show the same spirit of unity and determination as we have all shown in the past six weeks, then I have absolutely no doubt that we will beat it together, we will come through this all the faster, and the United Kingdom will emerge stronger than ever before.”
Tory MPs welcomed Mr Johnson back to work as he spoke outside Downing Street.
Matt Hancock, the UK Health Secretary, tweeted: "Great to see the boss back and on top form."
Mims Davies, the Employment Minister, noted: "The Boss is back. Vital, uplifting, optimistic words from @BorisJohnson on the podium outside Number 10. His tone, balance & the message was just right & absolutely what we all needed."
"Back at the helm," tweeted Sajid Javid, the former Chancellor. "Good to have you back boss," posted James Cleverley, the Foreign Office Minister. And Johnny Mercer, the Defence Minister, wrote: "Great to see him back."
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