The UK response - Part II - read OP

How could cases slowing be anything to do with less restrictions? Less restrictions could lead to less cases is if herd immunity is taking effect but the past few weeks have had negligible impact on immunity levels. The last two weeks have added 0.6m natural immunity, that is nothing compared to the 37m fully vaccinated and a further 10m with one vaccination.

Deaths are certainly linked to cases, people have to have the virus before they can die from it. Deaths in the UK in the last 7 days are up nearly 50% on the preceeding 7 days, that is due to there being more cases. The peak in deaths likely hasn't been reached yet even if cases have peaked, due to the lag.

While the actual changes which happened last Monday were too close to the peak in cases for them to have been the direct reason, I would say that the knowledge of upcoming removal of restrictions, and the general messaging, were contributing factors to the rise in cases. Attitudes and behavious changed due to what was coming and the nonsense around "Freedom Day". The Euros was obviously another factor but it's almost certain that many people dropped their guard in advance of any actual changes taking place.

I do despair how soft people are becoming.

A minister in the UK having to apologise for commenting about us 'cowering from the virus'.

I mean, people really need to toughen up if they find that offensive.

Sure and I think the UK have made the correct and safe decision by opening up as they have done. There's still the question however of whether we're seeing a delay in the peak in deaths which will continue to rise until that point or whether the peak will come in the next couple of weeks as has been the case in the past, in which case the peak itself will be low. However please note that in either case, nobody is expecting the sort of deaths that occurred in other waves.

It's not that it's offensive; it's ill judged to suggest that people taking precautions against infection are behaving in a cowardly fashion when, as the Health Secretary, you're supposed to be trying to promote public health and reduce the spread of infection.

Be a bit like a Home Secretary criticising people for being too spineless and sheep-like in observing the law, or an Education Secretary suggesting that students were all big girlie swots. You may hate your job and despise the people you are supposed to serve, but you're not supposed to let on.

Regardless of whether the peak is considered high or low (presumably relative to previous waves which are not comparable), a good portion of those deaths could have been avoided. The UK had just under 580k cases in the last 14 days, a proportion of which will result in deaths. They are giving around 50k first doses per day now, by vaccinating alone they would have reached this level of immunity quicker. Plus there would be a level of spread anyway which would have sped up getting to current immunity levels.

Had the Delta spread been controlled for the past few weeks, they would reached the current levels of immunity less than 10 days later but with much fewer deaths and without large scale absenteeism due to the requirement to isolate. It wasn't about keeping restrictions for months more like some like to make out.

If they didn't catch Delta, they wouldn't have died from it. If Delta was less prevalent there would have been less chance of them catching it. The scale of reduction in deaths had Delta been better controlled is up for debate, "much fewer" may not be totally accurate but I don't think "wouldn't have made any difference" has any truth in it.