Scottish lockdown extended until mid-February
Schools will remain online as figures deemed too high to safely change guidelines
Nicola Sturgeon has announced lockdown measures will remain in place in Scotland until at least mid-February, with a review scheduled in two weeks time.
School and nursery premises will remain closed to most pupils until at least the same point, when the Government may look to introduce a phased return.
This excludes vulnerable children and children of key workers.
"The pressure the NHS is facing right now is real and severe"
The First Minister warned that the numbers of new cases in the past few weeks meant that pressure on health care services was "almost certain to rise for a further period yet" and have a "significant consequential impact on non-Covid elective care".
Explaining the need to extend the period of restrictions, she said: "We cannot afford to see the rate of infection start to rise again, which from such a high baseline it certainly could do if we start to interact with each other more than we are doing right now."
The First Minister acknowledged the distress ongoing closures caused children
On schools, Ms Sturgeon said getting children back into schools as soon as possible was "a priority".
She went on to thank teachers, school leaders and other staff for the work they were doing to enable home learning, before acknowledging the difficulties closures caused for families.
The First Minister also recognised the damaging impact on children, and said: "Above all I understand how difficult, distressing and damaging it is for children and young people to have their education and their normal interactions with friends so disrupted."
"However, our reluctant judgement at this stage is that community transmission of the virus is too high and is likely to remain so for the next period to allow a safe return to school on the first of February."
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