Nicola Sturgeon update RECAP: Covid Scotland briefing from First Minister and Jason Leitch | Football fans 'chose to ignore' government advice | 'Renewed caution' over rising cases
Follow how the day unfolded in our RECAP blog, below.
Nicola Sturgeon update RECAP: Covid Scotland briefing from First Minister and Jason Leitch | Football fans ‘chose to ignore’ government advice | ‘Renewed caution’ over rising cases
Key Events
- Spike in cases ‘very clearly’ linked to Scotland football fans, health expert says
- 3,823 new cases recorded and four new deaths in the past 24 hours
- More than 50% of Scots now fully vaccinated
‘If you’re having someone round for dinner, open the window and don’t squeeze yourselves around the table,’ Prof Jason Leitch said.
‘Uptake rates for Covid vaccines are much higher than anything we would have expected,” confirms FM.
In the older age groups, uptake is almost 100 per cent, Nicola Sturgeon said.
She said uptake in younger age groups is lower, but still higher than the Scottish Government predicted.
The First Minister went on to urge people to get vaccinated.
Scots urged to use vaccine drop-in centres when they open across all health boards in Scotland mainland next week
All mainland health boards will be running vaccination drop-in centres for over-18s starting next week, with no appointment necessary.
Sturgeon said: “If you haven’t had a first dose or if you are now due for a second dose, from Monday, you’ll be able to visit a drop-in centre in order to get one.
“And let me stress, you can do this even if you’ve had a letter giving you an appointment, or if you’ve missed an appointment.
“If you’d rather turn up next week to drop in, you can do that even if you’ve had an appointment scheduled for maybe a week or two from now.”
‘Football not entirely to blame’ for surge in cases, FM says.
Speaking during the briefing, Nicola Sturgeon said while the spike in cases are being linked to Scotland football fans travelling to London, she said football is not entirely to blame.
She said the rules and precautions apply to everyone.
Prof Jason Leitch added that it is not just about football fans celebrating indoors or on coaches, he said the spike in cases is about “general community transmission.”
‘We’re not complacent about record case numbers’, says FM
Scottish Government was “not complacent” about the record numbers of new Covid-19 infections as she issued a plea for “renewed caution”.
She said: “I want to assure you that we are not being complacent about this.
“Our priority, our plan, is to extend vaccine coverage as quickly as possible. That is our best line of protection.
“But we will also be encouraging renewed caution on behalf of the population while we do so, because our biggest vulnerability just now is that – notwithstanding the success of the [vaccine rollout] programme – there are still quite a lot of people who do not yet have the protection of both doses.
“That’s why we’re making it easier for people to get vaccinated, and I want to stress that we are vaccinating as quickly as supplies and the clinical advice on the timing of second doses, allows us to do.
“And while we do this, our collective priority must be to do all we can to slow the virus down, and that really matters.”
Drop-in vaccine clinics for over-18s to open nationwide amid calls to speed up rollout
Drop-in Covid vaccination clinics for all over-18s are set to open across Scotland from Monday.
Read more here from Elsa Maishman
Vaccination is the reason lockdown has not been re-imposed, despite surge in cases, FM says
Ms Sturgeon said the success of the vaccination programme is the reason the huge increase in coronavirus cases has not led to lockdown being imposed again.
She said: “We are continuing to deal with a surge in new cases; it is heavily driven by the dominance of the Delta variant.
“Vaccination is the reason that this surge in cases hasn’t led to the reimposition of a strict lockdown.
“I think it would have done that at any earlier stage in this pandemic but now – and this is the positive thing about vaccination – the vaccines are doing much of the work that lockdown measures previously had to do.”
RECAP on today’s daily coronavirus figures:
Scotland has recorded four deaths of coronavirus patients and 3,823 cases in the past 24 hours.
FM said death toll under this daily measure – of people who first tested positive for the virus within the previous 28 days – is now at 7,726.
The daily test positivity rate is 10.8%, up from 10.5% the previous day.
A total of 285 people were in hospital on Thursday with recently confirmed Covid-19, up 10, with 19 patients in intensive care, up three.
So far, 3,831,770 people have received the first dose of a Covid-19 vaccination and 2,737,347 have received their second dose.
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