The “stay at home” order in Scotland will be lifted later this week and replaced with a request for people to “stay local”, Nicola Sturgeon has announced.
The change was announced earlier this month and confirmed during the coronavirus briefing on Tuesday.
From Friday, people will be able to leave their homes as much as they want, but will still be advised to stay within the boundaries of their local authority area.
Scotland’s ‘stay local’ restrictions explained: Here’s what you can and can’t do from Friday
The first minister said: “The stay at home rule is being replaced for the next three weeks at least with a requirement to stay local.
“That means the current travel restrictions, which prevent non-essential travel outside your own local authority area, will remain in place for another three weeks.
“I fully understand how frustrating that is for everybody – I share that frustration – like many of you, my family live in a different local authority to the one I live in, and so like anyone with loved ones in a different part of the country, I desperately want to see them in person.”
‘No grounds for complacency’
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon warned against complacency despite positive figures in the vaccination programme.
Almost 2.5 million people in Scotland have received the first dose of the vaccine, but the First Minister said at the coronavirus briefing people should still be “hyper-vigilant”.
“There are still no grounds for complacency,” she said.
“In fact, it is really important right now that while the vaccination programme continues to be rolled out, that all of us remain hyper-vigilant in how we’re going about our daily lives.”
The number of new cases is now “plateauing”, the First Minister said, after having consistently dropped throughout January and February.