INFECTION rates in Cheshire West continue to move in ‘a positive direction’ but need to drop further before some lockdown restrictions are eased.

Those are the views of two senior council officials, providing an update on the borough’s pandemic response yesterday (February 24).

Chief Executive Andrew Lewis said: “Things are moving in a positive direction and the level of infection is continuing to reduce — but our teams are still hearing about 400 cases every week.

“It is like a game of whack-a-mole — when the outbreaks pop up we can bash them. At the moment, there’s too many moles.

“We really need to keep a focus on getting levels of infection down.”

His comments were supported by Director of Public Health Ian Ashworth.

Mr Ashworth added: “Our rate is 123 cases per 100,000 — that’s 40 cases per day which is still quite significant. We have come a long way and a considerable way but we are still in the high levels as experienced in November.

“We have to get that infection rate down… before those stages of the road map come into play.

“Ours still comes down in steps along the way and we want to get it down as quickly as possible.”

Earlier this week, Boris Johnson revealed his ‘roadmap’ out of lockdown, with schools set to fully re-open from March 8, which is also when two people from separate households can meet for recreation outdoors, such as a picnic in a park.

On the roadmap, Mr Lewis commented: “Our focus over the next two weeks is supporting our school system for the opening on March 8. We are also extending our decision to protect those who are shielding from the virus and you may have seen the government has extended the list of people [shielding].

“We have 7,272 additional people who are advised to shield, bringing our total up to 21,772. The vast majority will have had their vaccine.”