Expert warns the ‘next few weeks are going to be the worst weeks’

England’s chief medical officer has warned that the “worst” is yet to come and has urged people to “double down” and stop “unnecessary contacts.”

Professor Chris Whitty warned that the new mutant variant of the virus is “pushing things” in a way that old virus was unable to do.

Speaking to BBC Breakfast Whitty said, “This is a serious problem and it is rising in every part of England.

“The next few weeks are going to be the worst weeks of this pandemic in terms of numbers into the NHS.

“This is everybody’s problem, any single unnecessary contact with someone is a potential link in a chain of transmission that will lead to a vulnerable person. We’ve all got to, as individuals, help the NHS, help our fellow citizens, by minimising the amount of unnecessary contacts we have.”

Professor Whitty said that “Ministers are always looking at whether they should adjust restrictions in either direction but at this moment, obviously, definitely not relaxing them. ‘The most important thing is that people take the current rules very, very seriously and do the minimum contacts they can.

“The most important thing now is for people to actually say, look, these are the rules, they’re really clear and we shouldn’t do anything that’s outside them, but we should actually, even within them, we should be doing our level best to minimise the amount of unnecessary contact with people who are not from our house.

“I can’t emphasise that enough. When you think about the pressures there are on the NHS at the moment, that is the thing that all of us can do to help relieve the pressures over the next few weeks.”