Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 13

[PatriciaHolm]

Taking the liberty of starting a new thread as we've just bust the old one, with much thanks to @BigChocfrenzy and I will copy her header..

Welcome to thread 13 of the daily updates

Resource links:

Slides & data UK govt pressers
UK dashboard sub-national data, local authorities
Beta Uk dashboard deaths, cases, hospitals, tests, partially sub-national
UK stats updated daily by PHE & DHSC
ONS UK statistics for CV related deaths, released weekly each Tuesday
PHE surveillance report infections & deaths released every Thursday with sep. infographic
NHS England stats including breakdown by Hospital Trust
FT Daily updates
HSJ Healthcare updates
Worldometer UK page
Plot FT graphs compare countries deaths, cases / million pop. / log / linear
Covidly.com filter graphs compare countries
Plot COVID Graphs Our World in Data

We welcome factual, data driven, and civil discussions from all contributors 📈📶👍

@Catyness

Does anyone have insight into why figures on the Zoe app website are so different to official messaging that virus infection levels are stable? In the last 10 days I’ve seen the number predicted to have symptomatic covid increase from 23,000 to 28,000 which seems quite a jump.

The app uses a modelling approach based on looking at the symptoms reported by users and then the results of testing that users have, then modelling out prevalence based on symptoms submitted by their entire user base.

Their model at present indicates that decline, at least, has halted but as they say themselves the current estimate is still within the confidence margin of their lower estimate so they can't say as yet that any increase is significant; and their estimate is still well within the ONS confidence range (15k -34k).

So - one to watch, but in combination with other sources.

@BigChocFrenzy

Excellent indeed, but we need larger trials asap to check this

Indeed; especially, as looking at the press release, it would appear that the 95% confidence interval on the odds ratio of the improvement is between 0.04 and 0.97; in other words, as far I can see, all that can be said is that it doesn't seem to do any harm!

And - cynically - someone's made a hell of a lot of money on Synairgen shares this morning, based on nothing but a press release....

I posted this in the studies corner just yesterday science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2020/07/10/science.abc6027

If an impaired interferon response is common in severe cases then there is logic in trying it as a treatment. Definitely needs more trials but it's given as an injection for multiple sclerosis so has some safety profile in a different presentation.

Good news on the Oxford vaccine

news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-oxford-university-vaccine-induces-immune-response-first-phase-of-human-trials-shows-12032287

Good - buying in more vaccine options
A French and a German company, each with different vaccine lines to Oxford:

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/20/uk-deals-doses-coronavirus-vaccine

The UK government is investing millions to secure two more experimental vaccines against Covid-19, increasing the chances of obtaining a vaccine that works for the population.

The agreement is to buy 90m doses of two vaccines, which would be enough to immunise frontline health workers and care staff, who will be the priority.
The government is effectively hedging its bets – the two vaccines work in a different way from the Oxford vaccine, of which it has already bought 100m doses.

Latest UK data - 580 cases, 11 deaths. Last Monday - 530 cases, 11 deaths. (all day announced).

Takes 7 day rolling average of cases by specimen date to 547 to the 16th (no point looking at later yet), from 571 on the 9th, (but largely stable really) with rolling average deaths by date to death to 49 per day for the 16th down from 75 on the 9th.

Does anyone know when this gets updated to week 29? Thanks ....
phe.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=47574f7a6e454dc6a42c5f6912ed7076

@PatriciaHolm

And - cynically - someone's made a hell of a lot of money on Synairgen shares this morning, based on nothing but a press release....

I do wonder if any of the directors have been selling.

Having had cancer for the last 14 years, it seems every month some company has a cure for cancer.

They don't of course.

But the press do like to beef up a good pharma story.

Still, it might be worth checking them out in a month's time if they drop back, and stick a couple of thousand in an ISA.

JulyBreeze ... Last night we learnt that one of the T&T callcentres, in Lanark

The call centre is in Motherwell.

To be fair to the pharma companies have to release this type of market-sensitive information, or they could be accused of creating a false market. From the BBC:

Stock market rules mean Synairgen is obliged to report the preliminary results of the trial

Yes, sorry.

Looking at the interferon treatment results after 28 days showed more of a difference than after the shorter study period.

I'm going to bookmark the at home trial and I'd sign up promptly if I develop coronavirus symptoms as I'd consider a 50% chance of getting the drug worthwhile. www.covidtrialathome.com/

Adam Kucharski: A country has "transmission budgets" for Covid

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/analysis-blm-protests-crowded-beaches-eased-lockdown-have-not/

Dr Kucharski suggests the concept of "transmission budgets",
where the value of R is broken down into its constituent parts,
is a useful one for policymakers looking forward.

"Countries essentially have a 'transmission budget' when it comes to Covid-19," ....
"Global patterns suggest there are only so many things that can go back to normal before flare-ups start happening".

One problem in the UK is that we don't know with any precision how different measures, such as school or office reopenings, contribute to the overall budget.
However, there is some evidence from overseas.

A study conducted in Hong Kong when schools were closed and track and trace was operating was able to isolate and measure the effect of other interventions as they were introduced and then relaxed.

"One of the most consequential physical distancing measures appears to be the work at home policy for civil servants, which was mirrored by many other institutions and private employers", say the authors.
"We estimated that

the effectiveness of implementation of civil servants working from home was 67 per cent
and the effectiveness of implementation of additional physical distancing measures including closure of high-risk places/facilities [such as bars and restaurants] was 58 per cent."

A separate study looked at nine interventions in 41 countries between January and April 2020 and found eight of them to be effective.

Closing schools reduced R by an average of 50 per cent.

Other things that worked included:
closing non-essential businesses (34 per cent);
closing high-risk businesses (26 per cent);
limiting gatherings to 10 people or less (28 per cent);
and issuing stay-at-home orders (14 per cent)
....
"Working out these budgets is incredibly difficult,"
says Prof Hunter, who like many other experts urges caution in the absence of firm evidence.

"We don't know with certainty what the real numbers are for each activity in the UK."

Public health poster from Japan:
their message for some time now has been quite sophisticated and about the "3 Cs" of COVID

Outdoor crowds - slowing the decrease in infections, or was this just a natural long tail ?

www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/analysis-blm-protests-crowded-beaches-eased-lockdown-have-not/

Paul Hunter, professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia.
" if you look at the UK transmission data in terms of the trend it's quite noticeable that there was a decrease in the rate of decline towards the end of June.

Throughout May, when the lockdown was solid, the rate of new infections was dropping by 20 to 25 per cent each week.
But by July, as a series of crowds gathered, this rate of decline slowed to roughly 10 per cent week on week.

Now the trend is flat and may even have reversed.
In the seven days to Friday July 17, there were a total of 4,264 new cases reported, compared to 3,857 the previous week – an increase of almost 11 per cent"

Helen Branswelll@HelenBranswel*l

1. It's not the flu:

This graph from a paper out today looking at excess mortality in England during the start of #Covid19 shows clearly this is on a whole different level than influenza.
They show excess mortality of the past 5 flu seasons vs. Covid.
Arrows, red lettering added.

All-cause excess mortality observed by age group and regions in the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in England

https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2020.25.28.2001239#abstract_content

Thank you for another sober, intelligent and very useful thread!
OMG that graph really brings it home Bigchoc😳
Love the Japanese public health poster💙🇯🇵💙
Love the concept of transmission budgets, I think this could help us all to think about the virus in a more nuanced way, deepen our understanding
Feeling more optimistic🤞this is an opportunity for global collaboration, a global common purpose 💙🌍🌎🌏💙

Place marking. Thanks for keeping this thread going.

'....possible trouble to come in the UK once winter sets in.
"As soon as the bad weather comes and we start living indoors again, that’s likely to be a big boost to the R value," says Prof Hunter.
"I suspect that unless by then we have an effective test, track and trace system in place – which to be honest isn't looking promising at the moment – then we, almost certainly, will go into a second wave."
The "reasonable worst case scenario" for the UK winter was laid out in a Government commissioned report by the Academy of Medical Sciences last week.
The modelling suggested a further 120,000 hospital patients would die in a peak occurring early in the new year if R rose to 1.7 in the UK over winter.
A less severe second wave might lead to 1,300 or 75,000 deaths between September 2020 and June 2021 if the R value rises to 1.1 or 1.5 respectively, it said'
↗️
Doesn't sound too good though does it☹️ when they say 'worst case scenario' do they mean if we take no mitigation measures at all?🤔

@crosseyedMary

'....possible trouble to come in the UK once winter sets in. "As soon as the bad weather comes and we start living indoors again, that’s likely to be a big boost to the R value," says Prof Hunter. "I suspect that unless by then we have an effective test, track and trace system in place – which to be honest isn't looking promising at the moment – then we, almost certainly, will go into a second wave." The "reasonable worst case scenario" for the UK winter was laid out in a Government commissioned report by the Academy of Medical Sciences last week. The modelling suggested a further 120,000 hospital patients would die in a peak occurring early in the new year if R rose to 1.7 in the UK over winter. A less severe second wave might lead to 1,300 or 75,000 deaths between September 2020 and June 2021 if the R value rises to 1.1 or 1.5 respectively, it said' ↗️ Doesn't sound too good though does it☹️ when they say 'worst case scenario' do they mean if we take no mitigation measures at all?🤔

So in that quote they say the deaths "could" be 1,300 or 75,000 or 120,000? Those are quite different figures and it seems to still be saying "we don't know yet"

I'm holding on to the fact that our knowledge of the virus, how it works and how to treat it is improving all the time so surely this should help keep figures lower second time around?

Can I ask (another) really stupid question.

Could the slight uptick in cases be down to track and trace? As I remember it im sure a number of countries had a slight rise after the easing of restrictions before a fall.

So could it be a combination of:

1 Person A gets ill and gets tested is positive. Their contacts are traced and person b who otherwise might have thought he has a cold as his symptoms are mild (and so ordinarily wouldn't have got a test) gets tested and is positive.
2 Random tests in areas of concern such as Blackburn and Leicester will pick up more mild and asymptomatic cases
3 Better access to testing. Anyone who has symptoms now can get a test.

So whilst there is a small uptick at the moment, using it to break the chain of transmission means that it should start falling again?

Just placemarking. Thank you .

Worst case values predicated on R reaching only 1.7 sound quite an optimistic worst case scenario

It is basically saying that reasonably strong distancing remains

I'm pretty optimistic now that a second wave will be a lot lower than the first for the following reasons

1. Those most at risk know it and know what precautions to take.

1. Treatment has improved and will hopefully continue to improve.

1. More people are aware of the importance of vitamin D supplementation in winter.

1. If numbers start to rise again there is enough testing capacity to pick this up and get mobile units/ local lockdowns in place.

Of course things like this wont help, we might need larger fines and jail for idiots.

Police are on the hunt for three vegetable pickers, including one who tested positive for coronavirus, who have escaped an imposed lockdown at a farm in Herefordshire.

Dont worry too much about an uptick in cases as long as hospital admissions remain low, it is likely to be an increase in detecting asymptomatic cases and reducing the risk of them infecting others. Keep an eye on figures for your local area although a lot of outbreaks are now meat factories or care homes. I wouldnt socialise indoors with anyone who worked in a meat factory though