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Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales (March 2021) Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales 2 Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales (March 2021) Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales 2 Ministerial Foreword The coronavirus pandemic has turned all our lives upside down. Over the last 12 months, everyone in Wales has made sacrifices to help protect themselves and their families and help bring coronavirus under control. This is a cruel virus – far too many families have lost loved ones, and unfortunately, we know that many more people will fall seriously ill and sadly will die before the pandemic is over. But the way people and communities have pulled together across Wales, and followed the rules, has undoubtedly saved many more lives. We are now entering a critical phase in the pandemic. We can see light at the end of the tunnel as we approach the end of a long and hard second wave, thanks to the incredible efforts of scientists and researchers across the world to develop effective vaccines. Our amazing vaccination programme has made vaccines available to people in the most at-risk groups at incredible speed. But just as we are rolling out vaccination, we are facing a very different virus in Wales today. The highly-infectious variant, first identified in Kent, is now dominant in all parts of Wales. This means the protective behaviours we have all learned to adopt are even more important than ever – getting tested and isolating when we have symptoms; keeping our distance from others; not mixing indoors; avoiding crowds; washing our hands regularly and wearing face coverings in places we cannot avoid being in close proximity with each other. The pandemic is not over – spring and summer give us hope of more freedom, as rates of infection fall and more people are vaccinated. But we must be need to careful – we can’t rush the process of relaxing restrictions and risk a resurgence of the virus. Scientific modelling from a range of sources points to the very high likelihood of a third wave of infections later this year. What happens between now and then will determine how big that wave is and how many people will be at risk of serious illness and how many will die. Our successful vaccination programme will help to lower the number of people who will suffer serious illness and die from COVID-19 but despite the phenomenal speed at which we’re rolling out vaccination and the high take-up rates, there will still be many people that won’t be protected. Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales 3 Last year, we successfully supressed the virus in Wales over the summer months through a combination of gradually relaxing restrictions and basic precautions, only to import new cases as people returned from their holidays overseas. International travel continues to pose a risk – it’s not just a potential source for importing new cases of the virus into Wales but introducing new strains and variants, which may be resistant to our vaccines. We will continue to work with the UK Government, the Scottish Government and Northern Ireland Executive to manage this risk. This may mean ongoing international travel restrictions to protect the integrity of our vaccination programme. We do not want overseas summer holidays to result in another wave of infections or a winter lockdown. This is updated Coronavirus Control Plan, which takes account of vaccination and the dominant Kent variant, sets out how we will move through the alert levels and how we can help people and businesses plan for the future, as we continue our careful approach to unlocking the current restrictions. We will revisit this plan after vaccination has been offered to all eligible adults – currently scheduled for the end of July – when more evidence and data about its impact will be available. We hope this will provide us with a path to relax all the restrictions but, at the moment, it is too early to make such a cast-iron guarantee. Vaccination gives us hope that the worst of the pandemic is almost behind us and there is a brighter future ahead of us for everyone. Mark Drakeford MS Vaughan Gething MS First Minister of Wales Minister for Health and Social Services Mae’r ddogfen yma hefyd ar gael yn Gymraeg / This document is also available in Welsh © Crown copyright 2021, WG42683, Digital ISBN 978-1-80195-388-7 Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales 4 Context Background In April 2020, the Welsh Government set out our priorities in Leading Wales out of the coronavirus pandemic: a framework for recovery1. This described the data, which would be considered, and the principles applied, when reviewing restrictions. These remain central to our considerations now, as they have been throughout. This means understanding not only the direct and indirect health impacts but also considering equality, wellbeing, economic impacts and other factors. In May 2020, we expanded on the framework, setting out a traffic light-style approach to easing the regulatory restrictions in place during the first wave of the pandemic (Unlocking our society and economy: continuing the conversation2). This moved from lockdown, to red, amber and green phases in various areas of our lives – seeing family and friends, travel, education and care for children. At that point in the pandemic, there were many uncertainties about the virus and the effectiveness of our mitigating actions was unclear. The approach was cautious and involved a gradual lifting of restrictions, based on the best evidence available at the time. In August 2020, we published the Coronavirus Control Plan for Wales3. This described the approach to managing coronavirus in Wales, from prevention, through to local action to manage outbreaks and incidents, to all-Wales measures. The plan recognised the vital role of local and regional responses to avoid the need for more dramatic national action. The all-Wales measures in the Coronavirus Control Plan identified the potential need to tighten restrictions over the winter period. The broad approach set out in the Coronavirus Control Plan remains relevant, in particular the need for all of us to play our part in preventative actions. Personal responsibility to continue to adopt protective behaviours as cases get lower, and the vital role of local and regional intelligence and health protection teams to respond to incidents and outbreaks, will be critical to avoid further lockdowns. 1 Leading Wales out of the coronavirus pandemic: a framework for recovery, Welsh Government, 24 April 2020 www.gov.wales/leading-wales-out-coronavirus-pandemic 2 Unlocking our society and economy: continuing the conversation, Welsh Government, 15 May 2020 www.gov.wales/unlocking-our-society-and-economy-continuing-conversation 3 Coronavirus Control Plan for Wales, Welsh Government, 18 August 2020 www.gov.wales/coronavirus-control-plan-wales Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales 5 In December, we published the first version of the Coronavirus Control Plan: Alert Levels for Wales document4 which set out in more detail how the national measures would be introduced in a more predictable way based on a framework of four alert levels. This approach aimed to provide greater certainty for people and businesses about the legal restrictions in place, depending on the underlying level of risk and other key factors. The alert levels approach was based on a body of evidence about what was effective in supressing coronavirus in the UK at that time. Since the plan was published, the new variant of coronavirus, first identified in Kent, has become the dominant form of the virus in Wales and the UK. This variant is much more infectious and transmissible than the version of the virus the original alert levels framework was designed to address. As the virus changes and adapts, so must we. In alert level four we had intended to maintain face-to-face learning in schools. However, the emergence of the new variant has meant this has not been possible and we have had to respond accordingly. The uncertainty and unpredictability we face as a result of the identification and subsequent spread of the Kent variant across Wales, means we have adopted a more cautious approach to coming out of lockdown. In February 2021, we published an update to our coronavirus control plan (Coronavirus Control Plan: Alert Levels in Wales – Coming out of lockdown5) which sets out our understanding of the impact of new variants and how our NHS Wales Test Trace and Protect service and vaccination programme are meeting these challenges. It described how we will come out of lockdown gradually, moving to alert level three in incremental steps, monitoring and evaluating the impact of each step. This builds on advice from the World Health Organisation, the Technical Advisory Cell (TAC) and Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), which all advocate coming out of lockdowns cautiously. This is a refresh of the alert levels, in light of the new evidence set out in Coronavirus Control Plan Coming out of Lockdown. In particular, the need for us to be more cautious given the transmissibility of the Kent variant and, over time, the impact we hope to see from the rollout of vaccines. We will need to revisit this framework again once the vaccine has been rolled out to all eligible adults – the target date for the offer to be made is the end of July. This will allow us to take stock of the impact of vaccinations and variants in circulation and reassess whether any changes are needed to the controls – and how we move in and out of the alert levels – during the autumn and winter to keep Wales safe. 4 Coronavirus Control Plan: Alert Levels for Wales, December 2020 www.gov.wales/coronavirus-control-plan-alert-levels-wales 5 Coronavirus Control Plan Coming out of Lockdown www.gov.wales/coronavirus-control-plan-alert-levels-wales-coming-out-lockdown Coronavirus Control Plan: Revised Alert Levels in Wales 6 We are now, however, at a critical stage.
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