The UK coronavirus variant has been “very simple” to track, national Covid-19 incident director at Public Health Scotland Dr Jim McMenamin has said.

Welcoming new data showing the UK’s vaccination programme is effective in lowering hospitalisations as “encouraging”, the expert said tracking the UK variant of Covid-19 has been relatively easy, with the variant appearing to account for more than 80 per cent of samples “testing on any day” in Scotland.

“That UK variant has been very simple, relatively speaking, to track,” he said according to PA. “And across the time period of these observations, it’s something which, although coming later to Scotland than in Kent or south-east England, now accounts for consistently on a day-to-day basis well in excess of 80% of our samples testing on any day.”

“Thus far, there’s nothing that we’ve seen of any appreciable number of such cases affecting the Scottish population from South Africa,” he said. “Almost exclusively those have been individuals who have been identified following return from travel.

“So it is unlikely that we’re able to see anything then about the effect of the vaccine for other variants, but certainly for the UK variant that we have seen across the time period of the study that we’re demonstrating for the whole programme a very encouraging vaccine effect,” he said.

Public Health Scotland’s expert Dr Josie Murray has said that the findings of a new study showing that the Covid-19 vaccines deployed in the UK substantially reduce the risk of hospital admissions do not have any bearing on the virus’s ability to transmit from person-to-person.

As a result, Dr Murray, the public health consultant lead for the EAVE II project, said she could not advise any major changes to the UK’s approach to the coronavirus pandemic.

“The first thing to say about these results is that the current vaccination programme shows from these data very likely to be preventing severe illness related to Covid-19,” she said on Monday, according to PA.

However, she warned: “I think it’s really important to emphasise that these data don’t support any comment about transmission or indeed transmission policy and therefore we wouldn’t be advising on the basis of these results that we should alter anything that we’ve got implemented currently to stop transmission of the virus from person to person within Scotland.

Overall, she said: “The brilliant news is that the vaccine delivery programme in its current format is suggesting that it’s working.”

“What I would urge people to continue to do is to follow all the public health guidance to stop transmission because these results don’t have any bearing on the virus’s ability to transmit from person to person,” she said.

Dr Murray also urged people offered the vaccine to take up the invitation.

“We can see from these data that you can protect yourself and your family and your friends and you can also protect the NHS by taking the vaccine,” she said.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s road map for easing coronavirus restrictions will involve four tests that must be met in order for any level of unlocking to begin.

If any of the four conditions are not met, the pace of the country’s unlocking could be slowed.

Tom Batchelor breaks down the four tests and what they will mean for England’s emergence out of lockdown:

Labour Leader Keir Starmer has said he is “prepared to give credit” to those leading the UK through its vaccine rollout programme.

Asked on LBC whether he would give credit to Prime Minister Boris Johnson for his leadership on Britain’s vaccination programme, so far, Mr Starmer said “I’m prepared to give credit to everybody involved in the vaccination programme”.

“It has been rolled out at speed, maybe by the NHS or the frontline,” he said.

Labour Leader Keir Starmer has said he “ideally” wants to see schools across England reopened starting 8 March.

Speaking with LBC on Monday, Mr Starmer noted that schools are already expected to reopen on 8 March under Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s road map to easing lockdown restrictions, which he is set to formally unveil today.

“That’s what the Prime Minister has said and we want to see that, ideally, happen,” the Labour leader said.

“I’ve been worried throughout the pandemic about the impact that being out of school has had on children and it’s been a real struggle, home learning, for many, many, children. Some of them haven’t got proper access to devices, etc, and there’s a huge wellbeing issue, so get our children back into school on the 8th of March, ideally,” he said.

The Labour leader also urged Boris Johnson’s government to set up Nightingale classrooms and vaccinate teachers.

“If you can put them up for hospitals, if you need more space in your schools, put your Nightingale classrooms up,” Mr Starmer said.

He said he had urged the government to vaccinate teachers before they return to schools, but said the prime minister did not “take up” the advice.

Emirates has dispatched its first flight for which all ground staff and crew have been vaccinated.

Flight EK215 departed Dubai this morning for Los Angeles.

An Emirates spokesperson said the flight was “supported by over 70 vaccinated frontline team members across the operational spectrum” – including check-in, security, lounge and boarding gate employees, as well as engineers, pilots and cabin crew.

The staff had “made the choice to be fully vaccinated,” the airline said.

More than 25,000 of Emirates Group frontline aviation staff have been vaccinated with two doses of either the Pfizer-BioNTech or Sinopharm vaccines. Slightly over half of the workforce are awaiting their jabs.

The Covid-19 vaccines distributed across the UK substantially reduce the risk of hospital admission, real-world data from Scotland has shown.

Four weeks after first doses of he vaccine being rolled out, both the Pfizer/BioNTech and Oxford/AstraZeneca jabs were found to cut hospitalisations with the disease by up to 85 per cent and 94 per respectively.

The research, which has yet to be peer-reviewed, is the first of its kind confirming the impact of the UK’s vaccine rollout.

The Labour Party has called on Chancellor Rishi Sunak to extend temporary business rates relief to help save theatres, museums, galleries and cinemas across the country.

Shadow communities secretary Steve Reed said Mr Sunak must give the arts sector some “certainty” and reduce the risk of losing jobs and the country’s cultural institutions.

In an addition to calling for an extension of temporary business rates relief to the arts sector, Labour is also calling for a temporary 5% reduced rate of VAT for the hospitality sector, as well as the tourism and culture sectors, to be extended for another six months or until three months after coronavirus restrictions are lifted.

“Theatres, galleries, cinemas and museums are the cultural heartbeat of our town centres but they are under threat as never before because of this Government’s incompetence and economic mismanagement,” Mr Reed said.

“The Chancellor’s dither and delay has created uncertainty for businesses, cost jobs and threatened our recovery, despite Labour‘s repeated calls to provide businesses with breathing space by extending the business rate holiday and the VAT cut for hospitality and leisure,” he continued. “Britain can’t afford the Chancellor to make the same irresponsible mistake all over again. He must give businesses certainty and reduce the risk of losing both jobs and life-enhancing cultural institutions.”

The findings of a Scotland vaccine study have been “very encouraging,” lead researcher Professor Aziz Sheikh, the director of the University of Edinburgh’s Usher Institute, has said.

“These results are very encouraging and have given us great reasons to be optimistic for the future,” Prof Sheikh said on Monday, according to PA.

“We now have national evidence – across an entire country – that vaccination provides protection against Covid-19 hospitalisations,” the professor said.

National Covid-19 incident director at Public Health Scotland Dr Jim McMenamin said the findings were “important as we move from expectation to firm evidence of benefit from vaccines.”

“Across the Scottish population the results show a substantial effect on reducing the risk of admission to hospital from a single dose of vaccine,” he said, adding: “For anyone offered the vaccine I encourage them to get vaccinated.”

Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi has said he will “happily” look into what more data can be made available on Britain’s vaccine rollout campaign after facing criticism over access to information after statistician Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter called the lack of detailed information “upsetting”.

Speaking with BBC Radio 4’s “Today” programme, Mr Zahawi said: “As of last week, NHS England have published CCG (clinical commissioning group) level data across England, which I think was important.”

“We collect ethnicity data and we publish that, and we work with directors of public health and local government to share mid-level data, without obviously in any way jeopardising people’s privacy and personal health data,” he said, according to PA. “But all that work continues at pace.”

“Data is our ally in this vaccination rollout and we continue to do more,” he continued.

The vaccines minister said he had not heard Prof Spiegelhalter’s comments. However, he said that as far releasing further data goes, he would “happily look at what else we can do”.

Prof Spiegelhalter had told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that “the office for stats regulation wrote to the Government … more than a month ago, saying there should be be much better publicly available data.”

“We don’t know about the numbers or the proportions by the priority groups – groups one to nine; we don’t know the proportions by ethnicity; we don’t know this broken down by region,” he said.

“I mean they do, somebody does, but we’re not getting it,” he asserted. “And I think that’s a real shame as it was asked for a long time ago and so far nothing has happened.”