COVID-19 out of control in London, says mayor

Sadiq Khan, mayor of London, says the spread of coronavirus in the city is out of control.

Khan stated this on Friday, while declaring the virus as a major incident.

With over 78,000 deaths, Britain has the world’s fifth worst death toll from COVID-19.

Prime Minster Boris Johnson had declared a “national lockdown” to contain the spread of the virus, while rolling out vaccines to citizens.

On Friday, the country approved Moderna vaccines to join those of Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca.

The London mayor said hospital beds in UK capital would run out within the next few weeks, adding that in some parts of the city one in 20 people have the virus.

“We are declaring a major incident because the threat this virus poses to our city is at crisis point.” he said.

“Currently, there are more than 7,000 people in hospital with Covid-19.”

He said firefighters have been drafted to drive vehicles meant for ambulance service as over 9,000 emergency calls were being received daily, making the ambulance service overstretched.

Major incident is a designation reserved for attacks or grave accidents, notably those likely to involve serious harm, damage, disruption or risk to human life or welfare, essential services, the environment or national security.

At the time of filing this report, UK had recorded 3,025,525 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 81,158, according to data collected from Worldometers, a platform that gathers data.