Why has london had so few cases recently?

[yearinyearout]

What's going on here? The other day only 24 new cases, then 19, then none. I've read the news and it's not making sense to me, unless loads of people have had it and created some kind of herd immunity why is this so low?

I don't think anybody believes that StrawberryRaven, it's just that the virus arrived in London earlier - think of how many people flew into Heathrow before lockdown. All the virologists believe it spread earlier and thus peaked earlier in London.

But that idea surely only works if you accept that London has experienced a 'natural' peak rather than one largely curbed by lockdown?

Everywhere in the UK locked down at the same time so if lockdown is what 'saved the day' and flattened the curve then you'd expect areas like the NE (who were weeks behind London) to see a massive reduction of cases quickly, because they had far less a severe outbreak to tackle in the first place. Yet, the most widely infected city is the one with fewest cases now and areas like the NE still have comparatively high levels of infection (vs London). It doesn't make sense.

@janet1267 - sorry, I took your post in the context of several others I have read in recent days which do indeed suggest that Londoners behaved differently. Your words didn't imply what I said!

But this was the case everywhere? I'm not living in London but plenty of people here pulled children out of school weeks before lockdown and massively changed their behaviour to try and protect themselves.

Living outside London, in an area with very few cases in the lead up to lockdown (only one confirmed case in my county until the weekend of 14/15th), my experience is that people largely carried on as normal until Boris’s first announcement of 16th. I did... I was at Centreparcs for the preceding and there was no social distancing at all. At the time the message was about herd immunity and I remember thinking that if I am going to get, I want to get if before the hospitals are overwhelmed... So some people will have taken action, by lots of people did nothing... it all changed the following week.

But that idea surely only works if you accept that London has experienced a 'natural' peak rather than one largely curbed by lockdown

I thought the idea of lockdown was to flatten the peak StrawberryRaven but I realise there are a lot of people on these threads who know more than me.

why did the pronounced ONS “death spike” only start in late March

We didn’t. The last time I looked there was a spike in January.

Just to add my two-penn'orth on my observations of how compliant to social distancing London folk have been - the main difference I've noticed in the last week or so is that there are lots of gangs of vile youths hanging around. Bombing around on bicycles in groups of six or seven, or just trundling around in pairs, and if they're all in household groups I'll eat the cat.

@Oliversmumsarmy

There was a mild peak in January as there always is in winter due to the flu. The peak from March is massively more pronounced as this chart shows very clearly.

fullfact.org/media/uploads/UK_spike_chart.png

Good post whim reaper. I’ve said this to people posting ‘crowd’ photos on fb but they remain unable to understand. Media has A lot to answer fur.

Central London went into lockdown early And well, around my office all the bars and restaurants actually closed before the official closure as no one went into work unless key worker. The streets were deserted. With social distancing it’s not wonder the numbers have dropped dramatically, however rammed buses and tubes will likely result in another peak

@AlecTrevelyan006

Makes me think of that Dean Koontz book?! 🤔

It's been here longer, more people have had it and we've reduced reinfection rates through lockdown.

It’s to do with how they collect input data

uk.yahoo.com/news/london-coronavirus-cases-data-141542010.html

The “mild” peak in January was about 2800 more deaths than the year before.

February might have been less because those that had it in December January would have still been recuperating so not spreading it around. I know if it is what our family had we weren’t working till March. I remember going out to the supermarket in Mid February and after doing the weekly shop sitting in my car wondering whether I could make it to H&B or would my legs give out.
I ended up coming home and deciding to make the 200metre trek the next day.

We were doing a form of self isolation before it had a name because we didn’t have the strength to go out and see anyone.

I work in London but live waaaaay out.
During lockdown proper I used to look at the traffic web-cams near my office.
The streets were dead.
Where I work in zone 2 it's a 24hr city and at 3am on a Friday morning (for example) there would be normally plenty of traffic, pedestrians, cyclists and shops/takeaways open.
Lockdown was very efficient in London.

There seems to be evidence (using anti-body tests) that only 5-10% of Londoners have had co-vid. We don't really know how accurate that test is, but I guess cases while continue to occur as lockdown is eased, but thank god, London seems to have had its peak.

Well they just announced 17% of Londoners have antibodies so I’d reckon that’s a fairly significant factor! The rest of the UK is around 5%.

‘Antibody tests suggest that 17% of people in London may have had coronavirus.’

Wow that is a significant number. Similar to New York which was 21% I think. Though I may have made that up!

That must be having the positive impact on the low infection rate and cases in London. Hmm.

I haven’t read the details or the evidence & I’m sure there are caveats but as a headline number it’s impressive.

I didn't think they had done widespread antibody testing yet- was it a random sample? Pretty good news if true!

Yeah I can’t get my head around it. Do they do random testing then adjust for the population? If true that’s a million people who have had it in London alone? Therefore death rate far lower than we think? I could be getting my stats wrong though.

Just wait for the post-VE Day celebrations spike to hit.....

Yes it’s from the antibody surveillance study - I’m not sure if it’s the Porton Down one or if there are others. I don’t know how many were sampled or any more details.

Doesn’t look like there will be a spike. VE Day was nearly two weeks ago.

Delatron NCY was over 25% I think, the last time I looked (better google that before I’m accused of fake news!)

I hope the ‘VE day spike’ is like the ‘Easter weekend spike’ ... ie never happened!

I would have thought any increase in infections would have become apparent in hospital admission numbers by now even if too soon to cause deaths.

I hope the ‘VE day spike’ is like the ‘Easter weekend spike’ ... ie never happened!

Or for many parts of the UK - the spike

ie lots of places haven't had one at all, never mind one named after a holiday weekend.

I’m very amused by people’s ideas of what London is like. I live in a leafy suburb and have a car! Where I live is much less sardine
I'm a born and bred Londoner. I've lived in leafy boroughs, I've lived in zone 1, I've lived in inner suburbs. All of London including the leafy suburbs is more sardine like than much of the rest of the UK.
The sheer number of people living there makes it so. London is very densely populated. Millions living in close proximity to each other.

Look at a map of the UK. Nine million living in one small part of the country. Of course it's crowded.