PM clashes with health officials over new curbs

Don’t cancel Christmas parties, says Johnson as adviser urges caution

- Rowena Mason Nicola Davis Aubrey Allegretti

Boris Johnson has contradicted leading scientists and one of his most senior health officials who advised people to cut back on unnecessary socialising in response to Omicron, as he urged people not to cancel their Christmas parties or nativity plays.

The prime minister said the best thing to do to counter the threat of the Covid variant was to get booster jabs, with a massive NHS effort backed by the army to offer all adults one by the end of January.

Asked what he would say to schools scaling back nativity plays and people dropping out of Christmas social events, Johnson replied: “We don’t want people to cancel such events. We think that overwhelmingly the best thing for kids is to be in school, as I’ve said many times throughout this pandemic.” He also stressed that current guidance to wear masks on public transport and in shops was enough at this stage, despite Jenny Harries, the chief executive of the UK Health Security Agency, suggesting people should reduce their social contact as fears grow that existing vaccines will prove less effective against the Omicron variant.

“Of course our behaviours in winter – and particularly around Christmas – we tend to socialise more, so I think all of those will need to be taken into account,” the former deputy chief medical officer for England told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“So I think being careful, not socialising when we don’t particularly need to and particularly going and getting those booster jabs.”