Police given new powers to forcibly quarantine coronavirus patients

Health secretary Matt Hancock has brought in emergency measures giving police unprecedented powers to force anyone suspected of having coronavirus into quarantine.

Under the 1984 Public Health (Control of Disease) Act, officers will be able to detain people in quarantine at specially designated infection units and arrest and return them if they try to leave.

The hurried new measures came after a patient who had returned from China and was completing a 14-day isolation period at a hospital on the Wirral attempted to leave before his quarantine was up.

This was despite all Britons returning on the evacuation flights having signed contracts saying they would remain at the secure facility. Staff at the hospital had reported not having enough authority to retain patients.

Mr Hancock said the spread of coronavirus is now a "serious and imminent threat" to the public and that the measures have been put in place as "an effective means of delaying or preventing further transmission of the virus".

The news came after the number of cases in the UK reached eight.