Hospitals in England risk being overwhelmed if lawmakers do not support the government's new plan for restrictions, Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove said.

A growing number of lawmakers in Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative party have voiced opposition to the tiered restrictions plan.

Defending the government's plans in an article in The Times newspaper, Gove said “difficult decisions” were necessary to confront the crisis.

The virus “is no respecter of constituency boundaries and the hardships we are facing now are unfortunately necessary to protect every single one of us, no matter where we live,” he wrote.

The level of infection across the country remained “uncomfortably and threateningly high,” Gove said, noting that the number of hospital beds filled with infected patients was not far from its peak earlier in the year.