Covid in Scotland: FM to announce outcome of lockdown review - BBC News
Nicola Sturgeon is expected to give details on the opening of schools to "some" children.
Nicola Sturgeon is set to confirm whether Scotland's Covid lockdown will be extended beyond mid-February.

The first minister is also expected to give details about the reopening of schools and nurseries.

Other steps to combat the spread of the virus, including tougher supervised quarantine measures, will be outlined in a statement at Holyrood.

The level four restrictions have closed non-essential shops and have seen a "stay at home" message put down in law.

They have been in place across mainland Scotland since Boxing Day and were last week extended to the Western Isles.

It comes amid growing concern that Scotland's vaccination programme is lagging behind the rest of the UK.

Scotland's national clinical director, Prof Jason Leitch, said Scotland would not see "all of lockdown lifted", but added that progress had been made in recent weeks.

He told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme that public health advisors had been weighing what restrictions should be eased first as infection rates slowed and the positivity rate went down.

"The most important thing is children and that's what we've trailed in the last few weeks - that we will get some kids back to school if we can possibly make it safe," he said.

"That's the recommendation, based on the public health threat of keeping schools closed."

But Prof Leitch said it was not time for schools to "go back to normal", adding that while it might be possible to allow the youngest primary-age children to return to school, it was "more difficult" to see older children back in the classroom.

"It gets more difficult at that end for a couple of reasons," he said.

"The principal reason is that older kids behave like adults in relation to the virus, so they can spread the virus and the new variant spreads proportionately more easily even in that group. So we've got to be cautious."

Scottish government ministers are meeting on Tuesday morning to review the latest data and decide what happens next, with the first minister due to give her update at 14:20.

The government says Scotland's NHS is on course to have vaccinated all over-80s by Friday and the over-70s by the end of next week.

But opposition parties have accused Ms Sturgeon of being "in denial" about the pace of the vaccine rollout in Scotland - with Prof Leitch admitting that "we do need to be doing it faster".

Scotland, which has about a twelfth of the UK population, has vaccinated just over 575,000 people while the UK tally stands at about 9.3 million.

And the country had vaccinated the lowest percentage of its adult population - 12.7% - of all of the four UK nations by Monday.

The figure for England stood at 17.8% while it was 16% in Wales and 14.8% in Northern Ireland.

During her daily media briefing on Monday the first minister said the current lockdown "is working" but warned that case numbers are still too high.

Pupils across the country are currently home schooling but Ms Sturgeon is expected to give more clarity as to how they may return to the classroom.

The most likely option is a phased approach that would see the youngest pupils and those with additional support needs among the first wave.

Senior pupils preparing coursework for assessment are also likely to be among the first to go back as this year's Highers and Advanced Higher exams have been cancelled.

The first minister will also update Holyrood on plans to keep the virus under control when the easing of lockdown begins.

Last week it was announced that people travelling to England from certain "high risk" countries will soon have to quarantine in government-sanctioned hotels so the measure can be more strictly enforced.

Scotland has its own quarantine rules, which differ slightly, as do Wales and Northern Ireland.

But tougher restrictions for supervised quarantine of travellers are expected to be announced after the Scottish government last week said UK Government measures "did not go far enough"

The move is a response to the emergence of new variants of coronavirus, from countries such as South Africa and Brazil, which are more infectious than the original one that started the pandemic.