West Midlands hotpot

[middleager]

282 cases as of yesterday and 28 deaths.

Matt Hancock says he doesn't know why it is a hotspot.
www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/coronavirus-second-hotspot-hits-uk-21724894

I'd like to join some of the dots for him, as I don't believe it's rocket science.

I live in the West Midlands and we started off very slowly.

We then had the following in quick succession.

1. Crufts - 160k vistors from 50 countries including Italy flying into Birmingham Airport

2. Cheltenham festival - 220,000? Visitors over 4 days, many flying into Birmingham Airport

3. 150? Infected passengers flying into Birmingham Airport from the Diamond Cruise ship and being told to self isolate

Despite repeated calls for Crufts and Cheltenham Festival to be cancelled, both events went ahead.

I appreciate Cheltenham is just outside the area, but many visitors will have accessed Birmingham Airport.

And now my region is a hotspot and Matt doesn't understand why.

I appreciate the region spans beyond Solihull and Bham Airport, but surely it's no coincidence that our figures are so high?

Bloody phone.
It's hotspot, not Betty's Hotpot...

I was expecting a recipe OP.

Cheltenham festival should not have gone ahead.

I also wanted a recipe

Neither should Crufts. have.

Neither Crufts of Cheltenham should have gone ahead.
Being the second city Birmingham was always open to higher community transmission and those events will just have exacerbated it.

The governments lack of action is criminal.

The hotpot made me smile.

I think those are all good possibilities for the increase but to be sure you would need more data on the cases and deaths. For example

Do the cases increases correlate to 5-7 days after Crufts?
Are infected people saying they have been through airports, train stations or other contact points?
Are any of the deaths related to care home / hospital infections?
If there an unusually high proportion of deaths of people living in extended families - have seen it mentioned that Asian families are like Italian families in that respect.

It could be that there has been a super spreading event or person as in South Korea rather than a specific impact from Crufts or Cheltenham. But obviously mixing all those people at large events does create a perfect spreading environment.

Crying at Betty's hotpot.

Sorry to disappoint. I'm sure there is a West Midlands Hotpot, so please do share if you have recipe.

It scares me that the Govt doesn't know why.
But then again the Govt never fails to scare me in its response to this crisis.

Birmingham New Street is one of the busiest train stations outside London.

Conference centres all over the place, the NEC, the Birmingham Arena, Birmingham International Airport and a number of universities with students from all over the globe.

There are plenty of passenger journeys which pass through Birmingham, which allows for infection of the locals as they commute to and from work.

A significant portion of the population are obese or have 'underlying health conditions' which makes this virus very dangerous.