Lockdown easing could cause an enormous second wave

Professor Hugh Montgomery of UCL Intensive Care Medicine, warned that Brits could cause a “massive” second coronavirus wave.

He said that everyone has a responsibility during this crisis to stick to governments advice, and if we all do then the second wave will not be as severe as the first wave.

Professor Montgomery who also represents the Intensive Care Society Charity told the Express, “When lockdown lifts, it would allow people to see each other more and the virus will spread.

“It spread largely from touching surfaces.

“So you would touch something that the virus has settled on and you put your fingers in your mouth, you rub your eyes or you eat something that has the virus on it and you get it that way.

“Or someone coughs on you because they are close enough to you.

“That is going to happen as we lift lockdown so the disease will start spreading again.”

He explained how the public are in control to prevent coronavirus from spreading further.

The expert said, “This all depends on how rapidly the lockdown measures are lifted and what people are asked to do.

“If lockdown is lifted and people wash their hands regularly and vigorously, keep their distances in supermarkets and don’t pick up packaging and put it down again and so forth then actually the second wave may not be very big.

“But if there is another second wave, the impacts will be large.

“The hospitals will be hit again, and the health service is trying to reboot.

“They are trying to deal with cancer screenings and urgent surgery, they have a backlog already.

“They really won’t cope well with a second backlog, that would not be good for public health.”

England would go back into a lockdown if the official estimate of the pandemic “R” number were to rise above 1.

The R rate measures how fast coronavirus is spreading amongst the population, and numbers above 1 means the outbreak is growing.

Last week the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) the reproduction rate across the UK now stands between 0.7 and 1, which is up from 0.5 to 0.9.