Has any research been done yet to explain how Covid spread to every corner of England so quickly?

[pinktaxi]

I mean how did Fred Bloggs living in a remote English village catch it? I can understand cities like London, with so many people using public transport, but how does an elderly couple living in their home in a small town of village, 200 miles away, catch it? And almost on the same time scale ?

[Lindy2]

I have seen an article where they analysed the strains of the virus in the uk.

As a pop said there were well over 1000 sources brought in to all around the uk. Mostly from Europe rather than China. The February ski holidays probably really contributed to the spread.

The Zoe Covid symptom tracker estimates that at the time of lockdown there was actually around 100,000 new cases per day happening. It was absolutely rife.

[ChubbyPigeon]

We had a pandemic, essentially a worldwide natural disaster. Thats what has fucked the economy.

Elderly people in sleepy villages still go out, they still go to supermarkets, cafes, attractions, hospitals. Young people in sleepy villages still need to work, to travel to cities. People come in and out of london all day everyday. Lots of people from birmingham travel to london, lots of people from manchester travel to birmingham etc etc. Its doesnt have to be one person travelling from london

People in sleepy villages still go on holiday, they still have family and friends, grandchildren - who yes maybe young children equally could be 18 yr olds going on ski trips/partying all night, sweating and shagging a load of other 18 yr olds, go see granny and gramps. Granny goed to her book group with the rest of the village, gramps goes to an art class. Its not hard.

[JassyRadlett]

Well, there's a UK patient zero somewhere.

It seems likely that this isn’t the case, in the sense of a single patient to whom all (or most) UK infections can be traced. As others have said it’s more likely there are many hundreds of patient zeroes who are at the start of different transmission chains.

Interesting news out of China today that they had about 10 times the usual level of flu in December. That aligns with findings from Italy (testing of wastewater samples) that the virus was in Milan and Turin in December.

[B1rdbra1n]

A real question about whether lockdown helped at all
even so I think it's important to remember that these are things we can only see in hindsight

[TheLastSaola]

I think people don't realise how many people are abroad at any one time.

I've been involved in planning for some of the airlines that have gone bust in the past few years.

For Monarch airlines alone, in shoulder season, they would have between 100k and 200k stranded overseas needing repatriation if they stopped operating.

Multiply that by all their other airlines, plus ferries.

And more in school holidays.

Those people aren't just living in cities, they are from every corner of these isles.

[CrazyToast]

Same way people catch colds and flu and bugs, I guess.

[TheCanterburyWhales]

Italy's patient zero was traced- to a German businessman.

The first documented and recognised cases in Italy were Chinese tourists in January. They had no contact with the second patient zero in Feb- the German.

I do get that by the time the UK began to act it was impossible to trace all the people bringing the virus in, but there was, scientifically a patient zero somewhere.

Italy was both lucky and unlucky in the patient zero sense- first cases- Chinese (not much attention paid- it's a Chinese virus- they got better quickly) Second outbreak- patient zero took longer to find (because he had gone back to Germany) and patient 1 was a young, healthy superspreader- but the hotspot he created was, relatively speaking, small but very hot so was sealed off from the outside world.

Of course if the UK's actual patient zero happened to fly into London (probable) there was never going to be much (even if they had wanted to) that the authorities could do.

[randomsabreuse]

Skiing at Feb Half Term - probably why Scotland had fewer cases initially. Skiing isn't a city only pursuit...

Ski resorts are ideal for transmission - some of the lifts are as packed as the tube in rush hours, and a lot of the indoor spaces are not well ventilated.

Then airports/planes, crowded buses back to car parks...

[SudokuBook]

I do get that by the time the UK began to act it was impossible to trace all the people bringing the virus in, but there was, scientifically a patient zero somewhere.


I had thought that but I suppose if hundreds of people are all bringing it in and starting their own outbreaks they must all be patient zeros in a way?

Scotland I am sure also had plenty of skiers returning from Italy and also there had been the rugby there.

[BlusteryLake]

We live in a hyper-mobile society. Even if certain individuals don't move very widely the parcels they receive and other people they meet do.

[torydeathdrug]

More of the UK strains are from Spain rather than Italy & France.

[randomsabreuse]

Quite a lot of Scotland doesn't have a full week in February... Our area just has a long weekend - suspect that reduces the numbers travelling as most packages are full weeks!

[Sailingblue]

I also wonder about earlier transmission. My baby was hospitalised with bronchiolitis over the winter. Quite normal and I believe there are high rates every year but the wards were absolutely chokka. All the nurses were saying they were just seeing child after child with bronchiolitis. While she was tested and had rsv, it does make me wonder if there were children in with suspected bronchiolitis that actually had Covid.

[tootyfruitypickle]

I’m actually seeing it as good news that it’s obviously been in europe(and so here) since at least December. Doesn’t this mean it spreads slower that we had thought ? So our current measures should be very effective , if we unlock carefully .

Need a good test and trace system (hmm) but once we have that surely it becomes like any other (serious) disease?

[TakemetoGreeceplease]

Probably something to do with the 23 million visitors to the UK in the first 3 months of this year. I'll never understand how we locked down the country but continued to allow people from all over the world to enter the UK with no quarantine and free to go out into our communities (and continue to do so).

[TheDailyCarbuncle]

@tootyfruitypickle

I’m actually seeing it as good news that it’s obviously been in europe(and so here) since at least December. Doesn’t this mean it spreads slower that we had thought ? So our current measures should be very effective , if we unlock carefully .

Need a good test and trace system (hmm) but once we have that surely it becomes like any other (serious) disease?

It'll become like any other not very serious disease.

Between 30 and 70% of those infected with covid don't even know they have it - they either have no symptoms at all or such mild symptoms that they don't realise they have covid.

Some people die of covid. Some people also die of every other single infection out there - in fact 11 million people die of from infection of some sort every year across the world.

[wintertravel1980]

Doesn’t this mean it spreads slower that we had thought ?

There is a study (discussed in the NY Times link below) that suggests that very first confirmed C19 cases in both US and Europe have not led to any further outbreaks. The virus mysteriously died and stopped spreading.

www.nytimes.com/2020/05/27/health/coronavirus-spread-united-states.html

Around the world, the new study suggests, the coronavirus arrived more than once without starting runaway outbreaks. In these cases, there was little or no transmission, and the virus simply died out.

However:

At the end of February, Italy saw Europe’s first outbreak. The coronaviruses there were genetically very close to BavPat1, scientists found, leading to suspicions that a German traveler had brought the virus to Italy.

That’s not the case, according to Dr. Worobey’s analysis. According to the computer simulations, another introduction of the coronavirus from China probably was responsible, and it may have arrived in early or mid-February.

“The lineage just happened to get into Europe and run wild,” Dr. Worobey said.

Of course, this study still needs to be analysed and peer reviewed but it appears consistent with the most recent findings that C19 might have been circulating in Europe earlier than originally thought.

[HelloMissus]

Elderly people were discharged from hospitals to care homes with spaces without testing.

Then agency workers moved from care home to care home and also within the community, taking it with them.

[WowLucky]

Because people from all over UK went skiing in Northern Italy over Feb HT?