Britain should be able to enjoy a ‘happy and free’ summer, Matt Hancock says

Matt Hancock says he hopes Brits will be able to enjoy a ‘happy and free Great British summer’ once most adults have received the Covid jab.

The health secretary says most adults in the country will have had the Covid-19 vaccine by summer, telling BBC Politics East: “In six months we’ll be in the middle, I hope, of a happy and free Great British summer.

“I have a high degree of confidence that by then the vast majority of adults will have been vaccinated.”

He warned that there will be a ‘tough few months between now and then’, with many restrictions remaining in place until late Spring. 

He added: “That’s not just the clinically vulnerable groups but then going to all groups, people like me, I’m in my 40s and healthy and we’ll have got through everybody.

“That will give a high level of protection. The more people take up the vaccine the more we’ll be protected as a society.

“So I think we’re going to have a great summer but we’re going to have a tough few months between now and then.”

Hancock refused to say when lockdown restrictions will begin to be eased. 

It appears hopes for summer holidays abroad are dashed, however, with cabinet minister Liz Truss warning that travel restrictions won’t be eased for the ‘foreseeable future’. 

She told LBC: “The priority is opening schools… children are desperate to go back to school, it is really important for their education. Parents, it is important for them as well.

“We have to just focus on step by step and summer holidays, I’m afraid, are a lower priority than getting kids back to school.”

When asked if the measures are likely to become ‘quite permanent’ and in place for the ‘foreseeable future’, Truss responded ‘yes’. 

It comes after the NHS confirmed all care home residents in England have now been offered a vaccine. 

A record-breaking 598,389 vaccines were administrated in just one day over the weekend with an additional 10,621 receiving their second dose. 

So far just under nine million people have had their first dose of the vaccine in the UK.