Cold-laden Boris Johnson insists he wears a facemask ‘wherever the rules say I should’ and refuses to apologise for failing to cover his face on a visit to HOSPITAL
- The Prime Minister faced questions over his trip to Hexham General Hospital
- He had to be reminded by NHS staff to put on a mask after posing with nurses
- He told press conference today: ‘I wear a mask wherever the rules say I should’
Boris Johnson insisted today he wears a mask wherever he has to under Covid rules, after being pictured without his face covered in a hospital.
The Prime Minister faced questions over his trip to Hexham General Hospital, after it emerged he had to be reminded by NHS staff last week to put on a mask after posing with nurses.
But he declined to apologise for being photographed bare-faced with a trio of masked nurses, even elbow-bumping them as he avoided a debate on Tory sleaze in the House of Commons some 300 miles to the south.
It followed his attendance at Cop26 in Glasgow, where he was seen without a mask as he sat next to Sir David Attenborough, 95, in the audience.
But at a Downing Street press conference this afternoon a croaky Mr Johnson, who is suffering from a cold, said adhering to mask rules was ‘the responsible thing to do’.
‘I wear a mask wherever the rules say I should and I urge everyone else to do the same,’ he said.
The Prime Minister faced questions over his trip to Hexham General Hospital, after it emerged he had to be reminded by NHS staff last week to put on a mask after posing with nurses.
At a Downing Street press conference this afternoon a croaky Mr Johnson, who is suffering from a cold, said adhering to mask rules was ‘the responsible thing to do’
It followed his attendance at Cop26 in Glasgow, where he was seen without a mask as he sat next to Sir David Attenborough, 95, in the audience.
‘People have actually seen me wearing face coverings quite a bit more regularly as we have seen the numbers (of infections) ticking up in the UK.
‘I think that is the responsible thing to do and I am going to continue to do it.’
After Mr Johnson went to Northumberland last week Chronicle Live reported that staff had to remind him to replace his mask.
He is believed to have taken it off to do television interviews before the pictures were taken.
Hospital management insisted that he had ‘followed strict measures, including wearing a mask, in each clinical area he visited.’
But rules for visitors posted on its website tells them to ‘wear a face covering when you enter the hospital until you leave’.
Labour’s shadow health secretary linked the mask-less images to Mr Johnson’s decision not to return from the visit in time to take part in the debate on parliamentary standards, after his Government U-turned last week on its move to rip up the current probe system to investigate MP wrongdoing.
Mr Johnson today admitted that a Christmas lockdown was not completely off the cards as he made a desperate plea for Britons to get their booster jabs and the UK’s daily Covid cases continued to rise.
The PM warned ‘storm clouds’ of infection were gathering over Europe and forcing nations back into restrictions, which highlighted how the UK ‘cannot afford to be complacent’.
He said people should get a booster if they want to ‘avoid restrictions on daily lives’, adding that it would be an ‘utter tragedy’ if double-vaccinated people died from Covid because they didn’t get one.
Mr Johnson also admitted people might need proof of a booster jab to be considered ‘fully vaccinated’ in the future, in a move which could cause fresh chaos for Britons’ travel plans.
The warnings came as Britain recorded another 39,705 daily coronavirus infections, which were up nearly a quarter on last Monday’s figure. But deaths and hospital admissions – both lagging indicators – fell week-on-week.
There were 47 Covid victims registered today, down 18 per cent on last week, and latest hospital data shows there were 976 admissions on November 9, down 7.5 per cent.
The PM issued his warning at a Downing Street press conference, where he also confirmed that people in their forties will be offered a booster jab and older teenagers will get second doses.
Asked if a lockdown would be necessary if cases continue to rise, the PM said ‘clearly we cannot rule anything out’ but insisted he didn’t ‘see anything in the data that says we have to go now’.
The comments came after Austria announced a draconian new lockdown on the unvaccinated, after a dramatic increase in infections, and the Netherlands imposed a curfew on pubs and restaurants to deal with rising cases.
Germany, France and Italy have also been seeing a significant uptick in their outbreaks. The PM was joined today by his chief scientists Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance at the Government’s first Covid briefing of the month.
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation earlier approved the booster vaccines to an extra 8million Britons in their forties. It said people could come forward for them ‘with the confidence that they are safe and effective’. A total of 12m top-up doses have already been administered.
Data published today by the UK Health Security Agency revealed that people who get a third shot are 80 per cent less likely to get symptomatic Covid than those who had their second dose in spring.
There has not been enough time to measure the effect on hospitalisations and deaths but officials claimed protection is expected to be ‘even higher’.
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