Third Covid wave has ‘already peaked’ — as Boris Johnson says: ‘We’re in the final furlong’

THE third Covid wave has already peaked, experts said yesterday — as Boris Johnson revealed: “We’re in the final furlong.” 

Infections have been on the rise due to the more contagious Delta/Indian variant, but hospital admissions and deaths are very low thanks to vaccines.

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PAThe third Covid wave has already peaked, experts have said — as Boris Johnson revealed: ‘We’re in the final furlong’[/caption]

‘Double jabs will be a liberator,’ says the PM

Yesterday, the PM fuelled hopes that restrictions will end on July 19 so life can “get back to what it was”.

He said: “Double jabs will be a liberator. I know people are impatient for us to open up faster. Of course, I want to do that. We’re now in the final furlong, I really believe. We have to look very carefully at the data.

“At the moment we’re seeing a big increase in cases, but that is not translating into a big increase in serious illness and death.”

He said it is becoming clearer the jabs rollout has broken the link between infection and death. 

The PM said: “It gives us the scope, we think, on the 19th to­ go ahead — cautiously, irreversibly, to go ahead.” He added there may be some “extra precautions” to curb infections — believed to include continuing to wearface masks on public transport and in some indoor venues.

However, he said: “I will be setting out in the next few days what Step 4 will look like.

“We’ll be wanting to go back to a world that is as close to the status quo as possible.” Yesterday, 27,989 new cases were reported in the UK.

In the past week there have been 146,360 — a 72 per cent increase in seven days.

But only 22 deaths were recorded yesterday, making 114 over the past week — a ten per cent increase.

AFPBoris Johnson said ‘double jabs will be a liberator’ as the country looks forward to Freedom Day[/caption]

An extra 259 patients were admitted to hospital yesterday, with 1,735 over the past week — an 11 per cent rise.

Kings College London says most people in hospital or killed by the virus have not been vaccinated, and Covid symptoms in the UK are now “more like a bad cold”.

Prof Tim Spector said: “We may have reached the peak of Covid infections in the North West and West Midlands, where the Delta variant got an early hold.”