Johnson warns of long virus battle on ebbing support

Bloomberg

Boris Johnson said Britain may not be free of the coronavirus “for some time to come,” an admission that highlights the difficult task he has of persuading people to return to work and schools as the nation’s death toll from Covid-19 remains the highest in Europe.
In an opinion piece for the Mail on Sunday, Johnson acknowledged people’s frustration with the “complex” easing of England’s lockdown, but called on the “good sense of the British people” to act responsibly and allow the country to slowly return to normal life. A report by the Sun on Sunday said Johnson has told backbench Conservative
lawmakers that he wants a return to near-normality in July. The prime minister’s article came as a poll published in the Observer newspaper showed support for the
government is waning. An Opinium survey indicated more people disapprove of the government’s handling than approve of it for the first time since it started tracking views on the pandemic in March.
“We have to acknowledge we may need to live with this virus for some time to come,” Johnson wrote. “We need to find new ways to control the virus. We will do that through testing and tracing.”
The opinion piece sought to put an end to one of the most chaotic periods of his premiership following his televised address to the nation last weekend. He dropped the “stay at home” message for “stay alert,” a shift that left many Britons confused as to what they were allowed to do outside, and whether they should risk returning to work.
“In return for the small freedoms we are allowing ourselves, we must stay alert,” Johnson said. “We must do so in the knowledge that our self-discipline will, eventually, lead to the return of our much-missed normality.”
In an interview with Sky News on Sunday, Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove said that the UK is “making progress” against the virus, and that the number of people being infected is falling day by day.