UK PM under rising pressure to lift all COVID-19 lockdown restrictions by end of April

"All restrictions remaining after March 8 should be proportionate to the ever-increasing number of people we have protected," it added.

"The burden is on ministers to demonstrate the evidence of effectiveness and proportionality with a cost-benefit analysis for each restriction, and a roadmap for when they will be removed," it noted.

Downing Street refused to be drawn on reports suggesting that restrictions on meeting friends in a park could be among the first to be lifted once schools are back.

England is currently under the third national lockdown since outbreak of the pandemic in the country. Similar restriction measures are also in place in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

To bring life back to normal, countries such as Britain, China, Germany, Russia and the United States have been racing against time to roll out coronavirus vaccines.