Parkrun, the international charity which runs popular 5k events around the world including in Bushy Park, has responded to news yesterday evening (June 14) that the end of the UK lockdown will be delayed by four weeks to July 19.

The charity now aims to re-start its 5k races on Saturday July 24, rather than on the 26th as originally planned.

In a post to its blog, parkrun said: "Following the announcement this evening from the Prime Minister, confirming a delay to Step 4 of the Roadmap until Monday 19 July 2021, it is now our intention that 5k events in England will restart on Saturday 24 July.

"A huge amount of work has been done in recent weeks to ensure we have permission to return from the large majority of landowners.

"Whilst this delay is disappointing, we respect the fact that a significant number of these permissions were contingent on the country moving into Step 4, and we will therefore target a new reopening date of Saturday 24 July."

Last week questions were raised over whether parkrun would return in Richmond if the end of lockdown was delayed beyond June 21.

Today's news will be a blow to the organisation which has already had fourteen months of cancelled runs due to social distancing restrictions made necessary by the pandemic.

Just two months ago, founder Paul Sinton-Hewitt, warned that the future of the event could be at stake .

But at the press conference yesterday evening, the government said the delay in re-opening will likely save thousands of lives as it will allow more time for people to be vaccinated against the virus.

Over the past week there has been a spike in covid-19 cases across the UK, including in Richmond's neighbouring London boroughs of Hounslow and Kingston, where surge and mobile testing is currently taking place.

This rise is driven by the Delta, or 'indian', variant, a strain of coronavirus which is much more spreadable than other variants and now accounts for an estimated 90% of covid cases in the UK.

Importantly, the variant is not associated with the familiar 'classic' covid symptoms of fever, cough and loss of smell or taste, according to the Zoe Covid symptom study run by King's College London epidemiologist Professor Tim Spector.

Instead, a headache, sore throat, runny nose and fever are the most common symptoms (in order) of a covid-19 Delta strain infection.

Speaking about the findings, Professor Spector told the Guardian yesterday that: "Covid is … acting differently now, it's more like a bad cold.

"People might think they've just got some sort of seasonal cold, and they still go out to parties…we think this is fuelling a lot of the problem.

"So, what's really important to realise is that since the start of May, we've been looking at the top symptoms in all the app users, and they're not the same as they were.

"So, the number one symptom is headache … followed by sore throat, runny nose and fever."

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