Javid warns hospitals against clinging to restrictions

BRITISH health secretary Sajid Javid has warned of action against hospitals which refuse to return to normal despite the government significantly lifting the pandemic restrictions.

Last month, fresh guidelines were issued to the healthcare sector to enable hospitals to attend to patients on waiting lists - which crossed 6.2 million in February.

Some 68.2 per cent of the UK population aged 12 years have received three doses of Covid-19 vaccine while 86.5 per cent have had two shots since the immunisation drive was rolled out.

However, media reports said at least one in eight hospitals have clung to restrictions, refusing to allow relatives to visit patients, despite changes to NHS guidance instructing them to open up.

For example, routine visits to University Hospitals Birmingham were still not allowed as of last week with exemptions being made only in extreme cases.

Javid urged NHS trusts to do away with the restrictions and threatened them to name and shame those that do not heed his warnings, according to The Telegraph.

Universities minister Michelle Donelan is also understood to have told institutions to return to face-to-face learning and vowed to investigate those which refuse to comply with government guidelines.

Donelan said it is her “duty” to call out universities that “refuse to keep pace with the rest of the country as we learn to live with the virus”.

“It is time for the stubborn minority to look at the rest of the country, look at themselves, and do the right thing. If they don’t, they will soon have much bigger problems to deal with,” the minister told The Telegraph.