Dr. Ronan Glynn:

There is not much more that people individually can do, unfortunately. To a certain extent, we are asking them to do less, that is, to stay at home. I absolutely take the point that it would be great if we could say to avoid a particular shop or building. Unfortunately, however, with the presence of transmission that is in the community at the moment, everyone needs to assume that the virus is all around them, that anyone they come into contact with can infect them and that they themselves are potentially infectious. As we have said on many occasions, the single biggest issue with trying to control the virus is that many people are infectious before they are symptomatic, so they can pass it on to others before they are symptomatic. People can access the Covid data hub, which offers significant information on the incidence of the disease at a local level.

On messaging in general, people may be aware that we monitor public behaviours over time through a tracking service. To focus on the positive, in our most recent survey, which was conducted on Monday last, 88% of respondents said they were staying at home rather than going out. I acknowledge that the immediate response to that is "Of course that is what they will say because that is what they want you to hear." In fact, if we look back through the responses from August, September, October and November, the percentages were down in the 60s and 70s. The most recent occasion on which the figure was above the current level was in April, and even then it was at 90%. The vast majority of people are doing exactly what we want them to do. The challenge is to sustain that over the weeks ahead.