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Coronavirus

01st Jul 2020

The government is to blame for Leicester’s new lockdown

Oli Dugmore

Leicester is in lockdown

The people of England are excited to return to the pub on July 4. Lockdown is easing, meaning we can return to some form of normality, eating out and enjoying a drink or two with friends.

But while (most of) the rest of us toast each other for dealing with three months of staying in our homes sensibly, half a million people in Leicester will not get to do so.

That’s because while the rest of the country is seeing reduced rates of Covid-19 infections, Leicester’s is rising fast. 10 percent of the new cases of Covid-19 infections in the past week have been in the city.

If this happened in other countries with proper contact tracing systems in place, then the city would likely be able to go about its business as usual, while cases were tracked on an individual basis.

This is Tory Britain though, and the “world beating” system that was promised by the beginning of June does simply not exist. As such, a whole city has to go back into lockdown.