Most COVID rules, including wearing facemasks and social distancing, are likely to end in England on July 19, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday, AFP reported. 

Unveiling a five-point plan for the final step of easing curbs, Johnson said, “We will move away from legal restrictions and allow people to make their own informed decisions.”

Johnson had initially aimed for a full reopening on June 21 but was forced to push back the date because of a surge in the highly contagious Delta variant, which now accounts for nearly all new COVID-19 cases in Britain.

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Mass vaccinations have stopped a resultant surge in hospital admissions or deaths.

“This pandemic is far from over, it certainly won’t be over by the 19th. We must reconcile ourselves, sadly, to more deaths from COVID. There’s only one reason why we can contemplate going ahead… in circumstances where we’d normally be locking down further, that’s because of the continuing effectiveness of the vaccine rollout,” Johnson said. 

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“We will move away from legal restrictions and allow people to make their own informed decisions,” he added.

Around 86 percent of British adults have had their first dose of a coronavirus vaccine, and 63 percent their second dose.

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But the government’s emphasis on personal judgment was met with concern by scientists, who worry that hospitals and medics could yet be stretched anew if the Delta variant runs amok or new strains emerge.

“Allowing people to make their own choices on this is, effectively, handing control of the safety of such spaces over to the least informed, least caring and indeed the most callous members of society,” said Peter English, former chair of the British Medical Association Public Health Medicine Committee.