THE END of the merry month of May has now come and gone and I recall halfway through the month Boris Johnson telling us: "We will let people know as much as we can by the end of the month about exactly where we think we'll be by June 21st."

He added: "I can see nothing in the data that leads me to think we're going to have to deviate from the roadmap though clearly we have to remain cautious in our approach."

But while some sort of message about June 21 would thus be expected "by the end of the month," what we got instead was the Vaccine Minister Nadhim Zahawi telling us that it would be "completely wrong to now speculate".

I would suggest the message from the Vaccine Minister is preferable to more boosterism from Boris.

The idea that the Covid crisis is done and dusted in this country is very wrong.

Additional to the dangers we faced from earlier variants, B.1.617.2 commonly called the Indian variant, is now widespread and dominant across the country.

So we should not be surprised by its presence in the BCP area.

Samples dating back to the beginning of May have been sequenced showing it had arrived and of the 29 positive COVID tests within BCP in the week to May 22, six have been sequenced with two found to be B.1.617.2.

We sorely need a "data not dates" policy and much less boosterism from the government.

Martin Rodger

Parkstone