Pressure mounts for national lockdown in UK as more areas face high alert level

In Scotland, a new tiered system of restrictions will come into force at 6am on Monday.

Students walk past a Covid-19 sign in Oxford, England. Picture: Steve Parsons/PA

Pressure to impose a national lockdown in England is mounting as the number of coronavirus cases continues to climb and more than a dozen areas are due to move into a higher level of restrictions.

The three-tier system is being called into doubt, with the NHS Test and Trace system recording its highest ever weekly number of positive cases and a study by Imperial College London finding that almost 100,000 people are catching Covid-19 every day.