The government was forced to act after modeling showed hospital admissions could reach similar levels to the pandemic’s first wave of infections in spring 2020 — a peak of 3,099 a day — if Johnson stuck to his schedule to end social-distancing rules on June 21.

In a televised press conference Monday, Johnson said he had no choice but to delay his plan until July 19, to allow more people to get their second vaccine dose. But he said he is “pretty confident” he will not have to postpone again.

“The objective of this short delay is to use these valuable, crucial weeks to save thousands of lives — lives that would otherwise be lost, I’m afraid — by vaccinating millions more people as fast as we can,” he said.

The government is expected to put the delay to a debate and vote on Wednesday in Parliament, where Johnson is likely to face anger from Conservative colleagues for backtracking on what they dubbed “Freedom Day.”

“If you can’t lift restrictions at the height of summer, and we are in the height of summer, then you almost certainly are looking at these restrictions persisting and tightening into the autumn and winter,” influential Tory MP Charles Walker told BBC radio ahead of the announcement. “I just have an overwhelming sense of pessimism now.”

Johnson had initially planned to drop all legal limits on social contact this month, in the final step of his “roadmap” out of lockdown. That would have meant nightclubs reopening, people lining up at the bar again, full stadiums and big conferences back in the diaries.

There was a reprieve for weddings: the 30-person limit will be lifted to allow an unlimited number of guests, as long as there is no dancing and social distancing is respected.

Variant Risk

The government will review the data again on June 28, with the possibility of easing restrictions on July 5 if it looks better than expected, but this is considered unlikely.

Covid cases have been rising rapidly, fueled by the highly transmissible delta variant first identified in India.

It’s now dominant in Britain. Infections in England are growing 64% every week nationally, Johnson said, and in around a third of the country they are doubling every week. That’s pushing up hospital admissions by 50% week-on-week, and by 61% in northwest England.

The emergence of the delta variant has forced a change in thinking on the vaccine rollout, which previously prioritized first doses to protect the most number of people as fast as possible.

Vaccine Rethink

But data show the importance of the second dose against the new strain, with a single shot offering just 33% protection compared with 50% against the previously dominant alpha variant, according to Public Health England.

New analysis from PHE released Monday found that two doses of Pfizer-BioNTech offer 96% protection against hospitalization, and 92% for the Oxford University-AstraZeneca shot.

The vaccines are “spectacularly more effective that we ever dared hope,” said Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser.

U.K.’s Johnson Faces Lockdown Dilemma as Covid Cases Rise

Almost 57% of all U.K. adults have received two vaccine doses — leaving more than four in 10 without maximum protection. The government aims to fully vaccinate two thirds of all adults by the time restrictions are lifted on July 19.

Faster Rollout

To speed the vaccine rollout, the interval between shots for people aged over 40 will also be reduced from 12 weeks to eight weeks: all over-40s who had a first dose by mid-May will be offered their second dose by the week starting July 19, Johnson’s office said.

Everyone over the age of 50 or with an underlying health condition, plus caregivers and health workers, will also be offered a second dose by that date, and all over-18s will be offered a first dose.

With businesses calling for rules to be eased, the government said there will be no restriction on guest numbers at funeral receptions known as wakes. But social-distancing rules will apply.

There will be no change in financial support for businesses hit by lockdown measures, Johnson’s official spokesman, Max Blain, told reporters. “At the budget we deliberately extended most support well into the autumn, acknowledging there could be uncertainty over the path of the virus,” he said.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak’s flagship job support program, paying as much as 80% of the wages of furloughed workers, runs until the end of September. It’s set to taper, though, with employers meeting 10% of the wages in July, and 20% in August and September.

“There are many businesses that need to move beyond social distancing,” Johnson said, adding that he is “yearning” to be able to allow that by July 19. “Fighting this virus, you’ve got to learn to be cautious.”