Bournemouth businesses to benefit if PM cuts isolation period

Those who are fully vaccinated and who now test positive for COVID-19 may not have to quarantine for the required seven days.

Many businesses in the United Kingdom have suffered in recent months with staff shortages due to the dramatic surge in COVID-19 cases, largely because of the new Omicron variant.

Ahmed Nased, who is the General Manager of Sim Sim food restaurant in Charminster said that: “The availability of people being able to come back to work [sooner] is highly beneficial.”

“As a small business it is normally quite hard to employ people as no-one wants to work at a small business for five to six years, so you constantly have to employ staff.”

“For this [having people self-isolating] to happen in a pandemic was very challenging.”

Current quarantine restrictions enable people to stop self-isolating after seven days if you complete a negative test on both the sixth and seventh day.

The Prime Minister, who was speaking to broadcasters after visiting a vaccination clinic in Uxbridge, made it clear that ministers were “looking at that and will act according to the science.”

The continuing changing circumstances of this pandemic however, leaves doubt over whether this is the right move forward for the public.

Despite the government’s plans to act quickly, more than 1.1 million people tested positive for coronavirus last week. While this may be a positive update for small businesses, ministers will wait until scientific evidence is provided to justify the change.