The social support ‘bubbles’ allowing those in England and Northern Ireland living alone to see one other household exclusively without observing social distancing take effect today.
They mean single people or single parents can see their families, some people can meet their partners again if they don’t live together, while the elderly living alone can see some of their grandchildren again.
But, experts from the SAGE advisory group to the government have previously raised concerns about allowing these bubbles to form, saying they could have “significant unwanted effects” unless done so with caution.
Meanwhile, the UK no longer has the world’s second largest death toll after Brazil surpassed it overnight.
And pubs and restaurants could reportedly be advised to ban shouting and singing among a raft of potential measures that may enable the hotly-debated two-metre social distancing rule to be dropped.
It comes as the death toll from the coronavirus outbreak in the UK could reach 75,000 deaths, advisers to the Government claim.
Yesterday, a further 202 deaths from Covid-19 were reported in the UK, while the regional ‘R’ rates were released for the first time, showing that it might be as high as 1.1 in the South West.