Still almost 50 thousand cases in the last 24 hours, with 8 thousand new hospitalizations and 179 deaths. Britain risks reaching 100,000 daily infections in the coming winter, but for the moment the government of Boris Johnson has no plans to take containment measures.

"The pressure on the health service is there, but for now it holds up", said Health Minister Sajid Javid, when instead it was the NHS himself who sounded the alarm asking to immediately activate plan B, the one that provides for the return. not to a real lockdown but to some restrictions such as the use of masks indoors.

With the cold at the gates, the free all without masks even indoors and the first vaccinated who begin to lose immune coverage, the Kingdom is dealing with a new surge in infections.

But the script in London seems to repeat itself with every wave: on the one hand, the NHS - already struggling with structural difficulties and with patients with other pathologies left waiting precisely because of the pandemic - asks Johnson to take preventive measures before it's too late. On the other hand, the prime minister, who has always been reluctant (until he himself risked his life for Covid) to limit the freedoms of his fellow citizens, who made it known that "there is still no need".

Europe's eyes are on Great Britain for two reasons. It was the first to vaccinate massively, what happens here today could happen to us in a few months. And a new variant comes forward (the AY4.2, or Delta +).

In the Kingdom there is also controversy over the slowness in immunization of young people (just think that after a sprint start he now has fewer vaccinated than Italy) and in the distribution of third doses. This is Plan A, and it goes slowly.

Plan B is not talked about for now, but it seems there is a "secret" number of daily deaths that the government is willing to accept before raising the alarm. The fixed quota is 250, and by now it is very close.

(Unioneonline / L)