Nicola Sturgeon announces new lockdown rules for Glasgow as people are asked not to meet other households after rise in Covid cases
- Reinforced rules also apply to West Dunbartonshire and East Renfrewshire
- Guidelines will be reviewed after a week but they will remain in place for 14 days
- A further 154 people were diagnosed with coronavirus in Scotland today
New lockdown rules will be enforced in Glasgow from midnight tonight following a spike in coronavirus cases, Nicola Sturgeon announced.
Under the reinforced rules – which also apply to West Dunbartonshire and East Renfrewshire – residents are no longer allowed to meet up with other households.
Only emergency hospital visits are allowed in the affected areas and anyone visiting a loved one in a care home must do so outside.
The guidelines will be reviewed after a week but they are set to remain in place for 14 days in total.
New lockdown rules will be enforced in Glasgow from midnight tonight following a spike in coronavirus cases
A further 154 people were diagnosed with coronavirus in Scotland today. There were no deaths reported north of the border.
Coronavirus cases yesterday hit a three-month high, forcing the Scottish First Minister to dub sound the alarm.
She said numbers were ‘undoubtedly a concern’ and she feels ‘a greater sense of anxiety today’ than at any time ‘probably for the last couple of months’.
On Monday, 160 new cases of Covid-19 were recorded in Scotland with Ms Sturgeon admitting Scotland is in a ‘fragile position’ after loosening lockdown rules.
It was the highest daily total of cases since May 16 and a significant increase on the 123 cases which were announced on Sunday.
The latest statistics bring the total number of cases since the start of the pandemic in Scotland to 20,478.
Despite the rising number of cases, no deaths have been recorded in almost a week, with the number of fatalities remaining at 2,494.
Speaking during her daily coronavirus briefing in Edinburgh, Ms Sturgeon yesterday said the ‘quite high’ numbers of new cases were ‘partly a result of greater numbers of people being tested’ and she stressed the proportion of people testing positive was still below one per cent.
But she added: ‘The number of cases we are seeing right now is a reminder to all of us the virus is still a very real risk, it is a development that concerns me and it is one we are taking very seriously.
‘We mustn’t lose sight of how important it is if we are to keep schools open, build economic recovery and retain a bit more normality in our lives that we do continue to suppress the virus and push as close to elimination of it as we possibly can.’
Ms Sturgeon said not all of Monday’s cases were linked to larger outbreaks, saying the rise of cases in Greater Glasgow and Clyde ‘seems to reflect a number of small clusters, rather than one or two more significant outbreaks’.