London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Sep 17, 2025

Winter plan: what does government’s toolkit to combat Covid include?

Winter plan: what does government’s toolkit to combat Covid include?

Boris Johnson announces restrictions that could be used in England if NHS comes under pressure

Boris Johnson has announced the government’s “autumn and winter plan” to combat an anticipated rise in Covid infection rates over the coming months, with a toolkit of restrictions that could be introduced in England if the NHS comes under significant pressure.

What is plan A?


The government says the current plan has five pillars in order to prevent any further restrictions from needing to be implemented.

An enhanced vaccination programme

Vaccines will be offered to 12- to 15-year-olds, on the advice of the chief medical officer, and a booster programme to offer a third dose for over-50s will begin within days to give the most vulnerable better protection.

Testing and isolation

There are few restrictions on everyday life in England but a handful remain. Those who test positive for Covid must quarantine by law for 10 days, and the same rule applies to over-18s who have not been double-vaccinated when they come into contact with a positive case.

School bubbles have been replaced with an enhanced testing programme, which the government says it expects to “continue for the rest of this term.” Free rapid lateral flow tests will continue to be available for the general public.

Borders

Restrictions on travel still apply, including testing before arrival in the UK and varying requirements in the days afterwards or mandatory hotel quarantine for arrivals from high-risk “red list” countries. Ministers expect to ease some testing requirements from low-risk countries within weeks.

NHS resources

There will be a £5.4bn cash injection to the NHS in England to support the Covid-19 response over the next six months, previously announced by Sajid Javid though this includes £1bn to help tackle backlogs in elective procedures.

Vaccinating healthcare staff is also a key component and the government is likely to order that Covid and flu vaccinations become mandatory for frontline health and wider social care staff in England.

Self-protection

This essentially means a repeat of the messaging around hand-washing and ventilation, as well as mask-wearing in riskier spaces and encouraging businesses to communicate to workers to stay at home if they feel unwell.

What is plan B?


The government says it is “possible that plan A is not sufficient to prevent unsustainable pressure on the NHS and that further measures [will be] required” though it has not set out the precise thresholds to trigger the following new measures.

Vaccine passports

Ministers abandoned proposals for mandatory vaccine passports for entry to nightclubs and mass events from 1 October but the plan gives them the right to reintroduce the measures should cases rise.

Currently, the NHS Covid pass available on the app will certify individuals based on vaccination, testing or natural immunity status. But if plan B is implemented, it will change to display full vaccination only for over-18s. The government advises businesses to make contingency plans, saying the change could be introduced “at short notice”. Businesses requiring the passport would include:

*  All nightclubs.

*  Indoor crowded settings with 500 or more attenders.

*  Outdoor crowded settings with 4,000 or more attenders, such as festivals.

*  Any settings with 10,000 or more attenders, such as large sports stadiums.

Vaccine passports have been fiercely opposed by many Tory backbenchers who see them as an affront to civil liberties. Opposition parties have also said they would fight their introduction, meaning Johnson could face a significant parliamentary hurdle.

Advice to work from home

This advice was dropped after 19 July and left to employers’ discretion. Home working is set to continue in some capacity indefinitely for most office workers where employers are changing to flexible working long-term. But Tory MPs have been clamouring for a nationwide push to return workers to city centre offices, especially civil servants in Whitehall.

Any return to advice to work from home would be a headache for the government, which was forced to U-turn last summer after a push to get workers back to the office was followed by a steep rise in cases. However, the winter plan says Sage advises that “working from home is one of the most effective measures available at reducing contacts … which has a strong impact on transmission and R [the reproduction number]”.

Mask-wearing

Masks were mandatory until 19 July in English shops and public transport. There is now no requirement to wear them in England, unlike in Scotland and Wales, though the London mayor Sadiq Khan has imposed them on Transport for London.

The government recommends face coverings in crowded and enclosed spaces but ministers, including Johnson, routinely fail to follow this advice and are regularly pictured maskless in the House of Commons.

If plan B is implemented, the government will bring back the legal requirement to wear face coverings in “some settings”, the plan says, likely to be on transport and in shops.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
French Debt Downgrade Piles Pressure on Macron’s New Prime Minister
US and UK Near Tech, Nuclear and Whisky Deals Ahead of Trump Trip
One in Three Europeans Now Uses TikTok, According to the Chinese Tech Giant
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
NATO Deploys ‘Eastern Sentry’ After Russian Drones Violate Polish Airspace
Anesthesiologist Left Operation Mid-Surgery to Have Sex with Nurse
Tens of Thousands of Young Chinese Get Up Every Morning and Go to Work Where They Do Nothing
The New Life of Novak Djokovic
The German Owner of Politico Mathias Döpfner Eyes Further U.S. Media Expansion After Axel Springer Restructuring
Suspect Arrested: Utah Man in Custody for Charlie Kirk’s Fatal Shooting
In a politically motivated trial: Bolsonaro Sentenced to 27 Years for Plotting Coup After 2022 Defeat
German police raid AfD lawmaker’s offices in inquiry over Chinese payments
Turkish authorities seize leading broadcaster amid fraud and tax investigation
Volkswagen launches aggressive strategy to fend off Chinese challenge in Europe’s EV market
ChatGPT CEO signals policy to alert authorities over suicidal youth after teen’s death
The British legal mafia hit back: Banksy mural of judge beating protester is scrubbed from London court
Surpassing Musk: Larry Ellison becomes the richest man in the world
Embarrassment for Starmer: He fired the ambassador photographed on Epstein’s 'pedophile island'
×