Dr Hilary Jones has admitted that he would prefer the UK to go into a national lockdown rather than follow the three-tier system.
The health expert dismissed Rishi Sunak’s comment about another national lockdown causing ‘terrible harm’, and insisted that the UK should ‘pull together.
In a Commons debate, Mr Sunak said:“We can’t just let the virus take hold but nor can we blithely fall into another national spring-style lockdown as the party opposite now wants to do, rather than following our regional tiered and localised approach.”
Mr Sunak added: “We need a balanced approach, we need a consistent approach and we also want a co-operative approach. But any responsible party calling for a shutdown of our entire country should be honest about the potential costs – economic and social – of such a dramatic measure.
“At the very least they should have the integrity to acknowledge that what they’re proposing will create significant damage to people’s lives and livelihoods.”
Speaking on Good Morning Britain, Dr Hilary commented: “What happens in one region tends to be followed by what happens everywhere else.
“This virus isn’t favouring Liverpool or Manchester. The more people that meet up, the more it spreads.
“We’re seeing rising numbers around the country, so the South is just behind the North, it’s the inverse of what happened earlier in the year.
“So I think we should pull together, and we should support one another.
“I think if we’re going to go into lockdown it should be a national one – get the numbers down, get the NHS prepared, increase capacity in intensive care.
“We can do a lot of planning now that can help down the line in the future.
“Rishi Sunak can say that another lockdown can do a great deal of harm, but we’re in a pandemic, there’s going to be harm either way – whether it’s in health or the economy.
“This is a really tough time. This is a major pandemic, and we have to accept that there is going to be some pain and some harm.”