Jonathan Van-Tam today warned the British public of “hard months to come” over winter.
England’s deputy chief medical officer said “too many people” believe the pandemic is “now over”.
Professor Van-Tam told BBC Breakfast: “I personally feel there are some hard months to come in the winter and it’s not over.
“I think a whole range of behaviours, including the use of face coverings, but generally the caution that people take or don’t take in terms of interacting with each other – that is going to be a big determinant in what happens between now and the kind of darkest months are the winter.
“The other things that are going to be really important are how people respond if they are in need of a booster, if they are in need of flu vaccine, if they are partially vaccinated, or indeed if they are unvaccinated – that will be another really important factor in terms of what happens over the next few months.”
It comes after the government said a further 293 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Tuesday, the highest recorded in the country since February. Although the total includes data from NHS England that was not provided in time for Monday’s figures.
There had also been a further 33,865 lab-confirmed Covid-19 cases in the UK - the lowest Tuesday figure in seven weeks and continuing a steady downward trend since mid October.
It comes after HuffPost UK revealed yesterday how an outbreak in the Houses of Parliament had forced events, tours and banquets to be shut down for two weeks.