FIRST Minister Nicola Sturgeon is set to hold a virtual coronavirus briefing with chief medical officer Gregor Smith today.
It comes amid high levels of Covid in Scotland with yesterday's figures showing that 3799 new cases of the virus were recorded in 24 hours, as well as five deaths.
📺 I will be doing a live Covid update at 12.15pm today. I’ll give a summary of the current situation and also reflect on what we all need to do to ensure that vaccines prevail in the race against the virus. Please tune in if you can.
— Nicola Sturgeon (@NicolaSturgeon) July 8, 2021
So far, 3,890,176 people have received the first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine and 2,808,902 have had their second.
The First Minister has previously expressed confidence that Scotland will still be able to move to level 0 from July 19 but stressed many restrictions would remain in place – unlike the plans announced by Boris Johnson in England. Speaking yesterday though she sounded less certain, warning she faces "not easy or popular" decisions in the days ahead.
She said: “The question is what pace do we take to get to the end point, how safely do we do it and – to be blunt – how many lives are going to be lost, how many people are going to end up in hospital between now and then?"
From today, Scots can now enter Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council for non-essential reasons.
From Thursday 8 July, you can travel for non-essential reasons between Scotland and:
— Scottish Government (@scotgov) July 7, 2021
🔹 Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council
Check the rules for your destination before you go.
These measures will be kept under review. pic.twitter.com/v2tYyMyF36
The current route map out of lockdown proposes a further lifting of the restrictions from August 9.
Meanwhile, black status has been declared at two more hospitals in Scotland due to Covid-19, with non-urgent elective operations postponed.
NHS Grampian said both Aberdeen Royal Infirmary and Dr Gray’s Hospital in Elgin have been at code black status in recent days.
It follows an announcement from NHS Highland on Wednesday that Raigmore Hospital in Inverness had reached capacity and declared code black status – halting all non-urgent elective surgery.
The briefing will be available to watch on the Scottish Government's Twitter feed, BBC iPlayer and BBC Scotland.
It is scheduled to start at 12.15pm.
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