UK’s Johnson: Too soon to ease coronavirus restrictions

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, returning to work Monday after recovering from the coronavirus, warned that it would be premature to reopen the country after the strict lockdown measures his government imposed in late March.

Johnson, the highest-ranking worldwide political figure to have had a confirmed case of the virus, said the U.K. is at “the moment of maximum risk” and said lifting restrictions before May 7, when they are slated for review, would run the risk of a second peak of the virus.

“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 are beginning to wrestle it to the floor,” Johnson said, according to CNN.

Johnson’s government imposed the lockdown after initially employing some of the least stringent measures of any country. Since then, in addition to the lockdown measures, the British government has set a target of testing 100,000 people a day by April 30. On Saturday, the government reported carrying out 29,058.

“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 [National Health Service],” Johnson said.

Neil Ferguson, an Imperial College London professor of mathematical biology who is advising the government on its virus response, said lifting the measures for all but the elderly and otherwise at-risk could still lead to up to 100,000 deaths.

“So, if we want to move away from lockdown — reopen schools, reopen workplaces, let people go shopping again — we have to substitute other measures,” he said in an interview published by UnHerd.