HEALTH experts called over the weekend for ministers to review the easing of lockdown restrictions as concerns grew over the highly transmissible Covid-19 variant first identified in India.

The government came under fire for delaying tighter travel restrictions from the subcontinent as scientists expressed fear that the variant was 50 per cent more transmissible than the so-called Kent strain.

Unions called for the health of front-line workers to be protected and for adequate sick pay to be guaranteed for all to ensure that those who need to quarantine can do so.