Nicola Sturgeon has said that she will “almost certainly” announce a new package of lockdown restrictions for Scotland in the next 48 hours to tackle the spread of COVID-19 after a total of 255 new cases was recorded in the past 24 hours.
No new deaths were reported but the number of people treated in hospital rose to 73, an increase of 10.
Speaking at her daily briefing she said, “I need to be absolutely straight with people across Scotland, that additional restrictions will almost certainly be put in place in Scotland over the next couple of days. Hopefully this will be with four-nations alignment, but if necessary it will have to happen without that.”
She confirmed that a meeting of the UK government’s Cobra emergency committee would take place, and said she would be speaking to Prime Minister Boris Johnson directly after the briefing.
She added, “I will be clear that I am willing to allow a bit more time for four-nations discussions to take place before making final decisions for Scotland, but I will be equally clear that the urgency of this situation will mean that we cannot, must not and will not wait too long.”
Her announcement came after the government’s chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance warned that the UK could see 50,000 new coronavirus cases a day by mid-October without further action, expected to lead to about 200 deaths per day a month after that.