Nine out of 10 wearing face masks despite restrictions ending

Around nine in 10 people in the UK are still wearing face masks
PA Wire
Leah Sinclair20 August 2021

Around nine in 10 people in the UK have continued to wear face masks despite them no longer being compulsory, new figures show.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) data shone a light on the locations where face coverings may remain when the coronavirus pandemic ends.

On July 19, dubbed “Freedom Day”, most legal coronavirus restrictions were lifted in England but the government has continued to encourage people to wear face coverings in busy and confined places.

Mr Khan told the BBC Newscast podcast with Adam Fleming: “We are trying to lobby the Government to allow us to bring in a bye-law, so it will be the law again, so we can issue fixed penalty notices and we can use the police service and BTP to enforce this.”

The ONS data also revealed more than three-quarters of adults in every age group would be likely or very likely to get a Covid booster jab if they were offered an additional vaccine.

It comes as England’s chief medical officer Prof Chris Whitty urged people to get the jab.

The professor revealed there were some “very sick” young adults in hospital with the virus.

He tweeted: “The great majority of adults have been vaccinated. Four weeks working on a Covid ward makes stark the reality that the majority of our hospitalised Covid patients are unvaccinated and regret delaying.”

“Some are very sick including young adults. Please don’t delay your vaccine.”

Separate figures published by ONS showed there have been 156,000 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate.

In addition, there had been a further 37,314 lab-confirmed Covid-19 cases in the UK.

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