BORIS Johnson has been forced to delay the end of England’s coronavirus restrictions by up to four weeks after being warned the move could lead to thousands of deaths and unbearable pressure on the NHS.

The Prime Minister announced the setback to the final phase of his plan to end the lockdown on Monday due to concerns over the rapidly spreading Delta variant first identified in India.

Experts feared going ahead with Step 4 on June 21 as planned could lead to hospital admissions on the scale of the first wave of Covid-19 heaping unsustainable pressure on the health service.

To avert this, Mr Johnson said during a Downing Street press conference that it is “sensible” to put back the end of all legal limits on social contact to July 19, saying he is “confident” no further delay will be necessary.

He hopes deaths will be significantly reduced by that point because two-thirds of adults will have then been offered both vaccine doses due to the delay being coupled with a reduction in the time between jabs for the over-40s.

Boris Johnson said he was announcing the delay to “give the NHS that extra time”.

But the Prime Minister told a Downing Street press conference weddings would be able to go ahead with more than 30 guests – provided social distancing was in place.

The same provisions would apply to wakes, he said.

Care home residents will also no longer need to self-isolate for 14 days after leaving for visits in most cases.

“We will continue to pilot events such as Euro 2020 and some theatrical performances,” he said, indicating they will be allowed larger crowds than under the restrictions currently in place elsewhere as part of the research programme.

Downing Street left open the option of ending restrictions on July 5 if the data proves drastically better than expected but conceded this is “unlikely”.

Mr Johnson did, however, announce a limited easing of restrictions to take place from June 21 as he faces the prospect of a rebellion from Conservative MPs who are furious about the delay.

Mr Johnson told the Downing Street press conference: “We will monitor the position every day and if, after two weeks, we have concluded that the risk has diminished then we reserve the possibility of proceeding to step four, and a full opening, sooner.”

He said he is “confident” that no more than four weeks will be needed and that restrictions will not go beyond July 19.

“It’s unmistakably clear the vaccines are working and the sheer scale of the vaccine roll-out has made our position incomparably better than in previous waves,” he said.

“But now is the time to ease off the accelerator, because by being cautious now we have the chance in the next four weeks to save many thousands of lives by vaccinating millions more people.”

Mr Johnson added that by July 19 around two-thirds of the adult population would have received two jabs, including all over-50s, the vulnerable and health and care workers, along with over-40s who had received a first dose by mid-May.

“To do this we will now accelerate the second jabs for those over 40, just as we did for the vulnerable groups, so they get the maximum protection as fast as possible.

“We will bring forward our target to give every adult in this country a first dose by July 19.”