Covid: Birmingham Council leader calls for lockdown

Council leader Ian Ward said the government needed to recognise the situation's seriousness

The leader of Birmingham City Council - the largest local authority in the UK - has called for a full national lockdown as local intensive care beds fill up and the numbers of Covid-19 cases skyrocket.

Ian Ward, Labour, suggested a lockdown of at least a month was necessary to curb the virus's spread.

He said the government needed to recognise the situation's seriousness.

The prime minister has said tougher measures will be brought in.

Birmingham is under tier four restrictions, the stiffest category in England, but Ian Ward wants further measures nationwide.

The city has seen a 46% rise in weekly case numbers, with 477 per 100,000 people recorded in the seven days up to 30 December.

Mr Ward told BBC WM that across University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Trust, which runs three acute hospitals in the city and another in neighbouring Solihull, 98% of its intensive care beds were occupied.

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And he added at City Hospital in Birmingham and Sandwell General in West Bromwich, which are run by another trust, intensive care beds were fully occupied.

"We really are back in the situation we were in last March and April," Mr Ward said.

"For six days in a row now the case rate has exceeded 50,000 nationally and the government needs to recognise where we are and unfortunately we need another lockdown for a period.

"It's probably going to be a period of over a month, I would suggest, but we need the government to act now to keep people safe."

Analysis: Kathryn Stanczyszyn, political reporter, BBC WM

The last time a national lockdown was announced, the man at the top of the UK's largest local authority had called for it 24 hours previously.

Ian Ward is again saying the government must get ahead of the curve or risk catastrophic consequences in the second city.

Birmingham's infection rate is spiralling and it faces a difficult double whammy.

A high level of deprivation has been shown to be a factor in the complicated coronavirus constellation.

It also has some of the highest hospital admission rates in the country, even taking population into account, and Intensive Therapy Units are currently 98% full before any Christmas surge has materialised on the wards.

The government hopes there's a fast drop in cases on the horizon after moving the city into tier four last week.

Ian Ward says that won't be enough.

Mr Ward has also written to Secretary of State for Education Gavin Williamson, voicing concerns about primary schools remaining open while the city is in tier four with rising cases.

Primary and special schools in the city are being advised to carry out a risk assessment to determine whether it is safe to reopen for the spring term, and if deemed unsafe, then "Birmingham City Council will stand behind teaching staff in taking that decision", he said.

"We know from London that once this new variant [of the virus] is in schools it will spread and then pupils will then take the virus back to the family home so we're in a really, really serious situation here and the government needs to recognise that and they need to accept in all tier four areas... unfortunately primary and special schools will have to close."

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