Coronavirus (COVID-19): Protection Levels allocation to local councils - 1 June 2021

Overview of decisions

This sets out the allocation of local council areas across Scotland to Levels. It summarises reasons for the decisions, drawing on a breadth of data and intelligence. These allocations reflect the outcome of advice from Directors of Public Health and the National IMT as well as Four Harms leads in the Scottish Government.

These changes should be made in regulations and will take place from 00:01 on Saturday 5 June.

Changes from 5 June

The following decisions have been made:

• Glasgow should move to Level 2, the positive trends first seen last week having been confirmed
• a group of 13 mainland authorities should remain in Level 2, taking account of a range of indicators including current case-rates, test positivity, and vaccination rates. These are (by Health Board area):
  • East Dunbartonshire, East Renfrewshire, Renfrewshire
  • East, North, and South Ayrshire
  • North and South Lanarkshire
  • Edinburgh and Midlothian
  • Stirling and Clackmannanshire
  • Dundee
• a group of 15 mainland authorities should move to Level 1, taking account of a range of indicators including lower relative and absolute numbers of cases, generally higher vaccination rates, low hospital occupancy in the relevant Health Boards and low mortality. These are:
  • Highland; Argyll and Bute
  • Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire, and Moray
  • Angus; Perth and Kinross
  • Inverclyde and West Dunbartonshire
  • Falkirk
  • Fife
  • West Lothian and East Lothian
  • The Scottish Borders
  • Dumfries & Galloway
• the islands currently in Level 1 should move to Level 0, taking account of a range of indicators including current case rates, test positivity, vaccination rates, hospitalisation and mortality trends, and noting also the generally lower level of travel to and from these areas, compared to mainland areas, and the opportunity to enhance testing and contract tracing for these areas and in relation to transport links to and from them 

Context

In making decisions allocating areas to Levels, we have taken account of a range of factors, including:

• the need to control  the virus and minimise harms from covid in terms of morbidity and mortality
• the need to minimise wider economic and social harms
• the need to ensure that restrictions are justified, necessary and proportionate
• the need to ensure that impacts on fundamental rights are understood and minimized
• the need to strike a balance between lifting restrictions at a local level, with the risk the virus will spread between areas
• the need to maintain public support for and adherence to the system of restrictions – including by making rules clear and easy to understand
• the latest available data (summarised in the attached table)
• the emerging evidence of vaccination weakening the link between cases and hospitalisation
• the evidence that the Delta (April-02) variant responds to vaccines, but that vaccines are much more effective after the second dose
• the evidence that enhanced public health measures can break chains of transmission and  move affected areas past the peak of infections, including where the Delta variant is implicated in the majority of cases
• the current very low levels of hospital occupancy and mortality
• the ability afforded by the Levels system to respond with higher levels if outbreak management and vaccination alone are not sufficient to keep transmission under control