SURGING Covid infections and a potentially difficult winter dominated the comment sections of the newspapers.

The Daily Mail

Henry Deedes said the vaccines minister Maggie Throup was summoned to answer an urgent question from Labour’s health spokesman Jon Ashworth on the Government’s coronavirus winter strategy now that infections are on the rise again.

“Answers were punctuated with hesitant pauses and the occasional flash of bamboozlement,” he said. “There was an over reliance on prepared answers. And every now and again there would be a hurried shuffle of papers as she struggled to locate a figure from her clippings.”

He said it was no wonder Number 10 is yet to’ unleash her on a tour of the television studios.’

“Holly Mumby-Croft (Con, Scunthorpe) demanded a vote before the imposition of any new restrictions in the coming weeks,” he said. “Whoa, hold your horses, said Throup. We were still some way off all that. From Labour’s benches we heard the usual sermons from on high about ‘protecting the NHS’. Isn’t it meant to protect us? Anyway, Throup survived just about. Sometimes in this game that’s all a debutante can ask for. “

The Guardian

Devi Sridhar, chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh, said that in Frankfurt you can’t go into a restaurant or have a drink in a bar without presenting certification of full vaccination or a negative test result from the last 24 hours.

“When in shops and on public transport masks are required - and not cloth masks,” she said. “Only surgical or FFP2 medical grade masks are permitted.”

She said it was not surprising that Germany is managing to control its Covid epidemic and bring down the numbers of cases and deaths.

“England (and the UK) by contrast is seeing a sharp rise in cases,” she said. “Time is running out to put in some basic measures to prevent a further spike in cases, the NHS becoming overwhelmed, and very possibly another lockdown.”

The Independent

Hannah Fearn said Britain is now firmly split into two camps.

“There are those for whom the fatigue of the last 18 months has won out over the fear; who travel and socialise freely without masks, worrying only a little, if at all, about what lies ahead,” she said. “But there are just as many – those yet to contract the virus, those who are clinically vulnerable, or those who have children inside the broiling pit of germs that is an autumn classroom – who still live with a daily dose of anxiety.”

She said every time she watched the news she was convinced she felt a bit short of breath.

“Despite a world-leading vaccine programme early this year, the UK death rate is still steadily climbing and the case rate is soaring.

Why isn’t the cabinet still taking weekly Covid advice from Sage experts, when Covid is the No 1 risk to the nation’s economic stability, even above Brexit?”