Britons are taking fewer precautions towards Covid-19 than at any point during the pandemic, according to the latest polling data, as unease grows among government science advisers about a rising wave of infections and hospital admissions prompted by the Omicron BA.2 offshoot.
When Omicron hit late last year, Britons began to exercise greater caution towards social gatherings, public transport use and office working, reversing 10 months of waning carefulness after a two-month lockdown at the start of 2021.
Since the new year, however, behavioural caution has begun to dip again, falling to a pandemic low in the second week of March following the government’s decision to end all legal restrictions in England and the easing of Covid curbs in the other nations.