The 14-day self-isolation period for holidaymakers and people who have had close contact with coronavirus patients will be cut to 10 days from Monday.
The UK's Chief Medical Officers unveiled the changes on Friday, after deciding the quarantine period could be slashed. The move, which comes into effect at 00.01 on Monday, gives Brits an extra four days of mixing from now without running the risk of having to self-isolate over Christmas.
In a joint statement, the top medics said: “Self-isolation is essential to reducing the spread of COVID as it breaks the chains of transmission. “After reviewing the evidence, we are now confident that we can reduce the number of days that contacts self-isolate from 14 days to 10 days.