North south divide in covid outbreak

[weepingwillow22]

I was struck by this map on the zoe app showing the number of current infections per million people.

There is such a marked divide between the north and south of the UK, from the Highlands of Scotland where there are 2900 cases per million to the north of England where it drops to an average of around 2000, to the midlands which are at about 1500 and then to the south east which is around 500 to 1000 and then finally the south west which is below 500.

Does anyone have any views on the reasons for this regional disparity. I am wondering if it is climate related as an earlier autumn in the north means faster spread of the virus.

If this is the case though it does not bode well for all of us heading into winter. Any views?

Imo ,it's the minority spoiling it for the majority ,so many people refusing to wear masks and not social distancing,and generally not giving a toss lots of groups of teens congregating on the park behind my house ,it just goes on and on

I found summer very pleasant actually yes we had some cool and damp days but some very pleasant weather

Maybe the map shows that we are friendlier op north!!!!

Could be lots of things - but how accurate is the map?

If there is a true north south divide then I'm going to throw in vitamin d levels as one suggestion.... I am thinking about the link between vitamin d and the immune system and also its role in reducing inflammation... lower vitamin d levels have been linked to more serious cases and uv levels are lower the further north you travel... I'm sure it's not that simplistic, there will be lots of factors at play ...

If it's weather related how does that explain the rise in cases in Spain and France ?

I doubt there is a single factor...

Jesus. I knew this thread would likely have some ridiculous stereotypes of North vs. South but it's actually hilarious that some posters seem to genuinely believe that the majority of people living up North are working class. Southerners continue to think the North is some backwards, uneducated (uncompliant) rural, hovel

Reminds me of when I holidayed with friends in Spain as a teenager at her parents holiday home and we met some Southern teens whose parents also owned a property out there. They shrilly asked us 'are you from the North?!' like they were asking if we were from Mordor or something. When we said yes they couldn't get away fast enough Nasty snobs... Ironically my friends family were much wealthier and more connected than theirs.

I agree @annabel85 that it is still the first wave up North in many areas.

And fwiw, I am actually originally from down South!

London numbers were dropping off more rapidly than elsewhere. It may be nowhere near herd immunity but enough people stopped commuting and WFH combined with the immunity brought by the much higher prevalence in march / April.

Just look how Johnson, Hancock, Whitty, Valance, Harries all say they had it.

Can't think of anyone prominent in Scotland yet? It hit care homes very badly here but it wasn't about at the same levels in the community that we heard tell.

That's the other main factor with north and south. The south have had a hot summer, it's a lot cooler up north and much less sunshine on average.

Londoners have been socialising a lot more outdoors and the south in general on beaches.

Where do you live? Because there is no area of the north I've been in lately where people weren't outside a lot. And I live in GM.

Since we're airing the stereotypes on this thread, I'm going to cite an actually accurate one and point out that our threshold for t-shirt and shorts weather is, well, not necessarily the same as that of people in warmer areas! People in GM have also had a particularly strong incentive to get to beaches, and believe you me, we have been doing. Ask anyone on the north coast of Wales. It was rammed with Mancs all summer long.

I do think there may be something to the Vitamin D point regarding covid generally, but it's pretty obviously not the answer to why the north west is experiencing such high cases now. It's been a pretty sunny summer, we're if anything more likely to have access to our own outside space than eg Londoners are, people from the north do not and never have required hot temperatures to go outside wearing not much, and if the latitude were a significant factor we'd be doing loads better than the large area of the UK that is further north than us. We're not.

Where I am in the south Covid barely touched us back in March and April, we were very fortunate however I am fully expecting it to spread south and we will get a lot more cases during the autumn and winter than we did in the spring. I’m not holding much faith in herd immunity just yet, time will tell. I believe schools will play a huge part in the spread.

@AlecTrevelyan006

It was rife in London before lockdown and as a result now London is, at or very close to, herd immunity.

This ... I am near London know so many people that had it from jan !!!! Someone from October who was in China tested positive for antibodies

@pontypridd

Is there such a thing as herd immunity with Covid?

Perhaps it could be the weather being warmer and sunnier in the south?

Prob not convinced it is man made

Andy Burnham said at the time that the lockdown was being lifted too early for the North West but the government didn't listen.

@FiveGoToLidl

we had it badly in London in Feb/March/April

if you were unfortunate enough to be commuting in that time (I was), you would have heard everyone coughing! I was tested for antibodies and have them (I got ill in March). I don't form part of the officially tested number as I wasn't in hospital and I imagine there are many many more like me who were ill in that time and actually had Covid.

I was in London then and totally agree I gave my antibody test in November

I did wonder if it was about wfh, obvious stereotype but there is more manufacturing up north which cannot be done from home, also quite a bit of public sector offices relocated up there has there been a push to get them back in - in line with the government’s get people back to the office push? In London wfh is still the absolute norm amongst my small group of friends/ people I know (With the exception of those who wired through) I didn’t know if that was replicated country wide?

I rather suspect it’s more about a spark to start a fire if a few super spreaders spread it to loads and a most people to very few then u suspect there just hasn’t been the same “spark” in the south yet and when there is it will be big! I don’t buy the herd immunity point - look aT Madrid!

There is some community in London, enough to dampen any surge, but it would be wrong to think this is likely to be full herd immunity or anything close. There have been many localities worldwide with antibodies around 50-70%. Latest studies show London has 13%, though it will very likely be quite a bit higher than this amongst some communities in some inner boroughs in which there is quite probably is sufficient immunity to substantially blunt infection rise.

There is some community immunity in London....

Also when it was endemic in London we shut the whole country down. Now London is doing ok, that is over and instead we have a confusing mess of local restrictions.

This is so true

It was much worse early in in the SE and lockdown came while cases were still very low further North so I'm wondering it's because immunity is better established than suggested, although I do appreciate that comes with a large amount of wishful thinking.

I wonder if it might be that Southern industry is of a type more likely to have people still wfh?

Or because Southerners are less sociable?

@Witchend

I think there's a mixture of things. When it increases in one region, then it tends to gradually spread out like diffusion. Boundaries aren't rigid, so people will go over, to work, school, shop etc. I can go to 3 different counties within 10 minutes in the car.

At the beginning we saw that with London. London was the big one and then it spread outwards. Now it was the big places in the north that it's spreading through.

The earlier autumn is an interesting theory though.

I don't know the answer and am luckily working from home. DW and the children are at schools everyday and we have had to take two Covid tests.

Housing is quite dense where I live, but I don't know any of the neighbours apart from to say good morning.

Is it because I'm in the South East and we don't communicate with our immediate community?

Equally the above post says the payer can access several counties in a short amount of time. It takes us over an hour to change counties and then we usually have to pay the Dart charge!

Is it not something as simple that London suffered massively at the beginning of the pandemic ,and London. Inhabitants might be far more wary than Manchester ? Just reading the comments in the Bolton news articles suggest s some people still don't believe there is a pandemic 🙄whilst I'm sure this is the case in many places it might explain to some extent why we are so.badly affected also we haven't had that many deaths less than 300,however sadly hospital admission,s are going up

In France there have been higher cases in the south this summer despite the fact that the weather is warmer there. Whereas in the spring it was Paris and the East of France that was badly affected.

Therefore it would seem that places most badly affected now are places that did not have much exposure to covid before lockdown in the spring irrespective of the temperatures.

One could also argue the south of France is affected by the number of holiday makers going there. However in England beaches in the south and Devon/Cornwall have been very busy but there has not been an obvious uptick in infections as a result. Maybe this is due to the fact that most people were on the beach or in their accommodation and not going to indoor night clubs as I think happened in France/Spain

Now more people are commuting to London and schools are back I expect numbers will start to rise in the home counties/south. Hopefully not at the rate they did in March. I imagine that numbers will remain low in more sparsely populated counties further from London eg. Devon and Cornwall.

I don't think the Zoe app is good. There will be more people reporting down south but there's a huge confidence interval in Scotland. We had a local outbreak (like 100 confirmed cases) and the app was still telling me that there were half the number of cases in my area that the local papers were reporting. I've lost faith in their numbers now.

Yep the areas hardest hit the first time round seem to be suffering less now.

Even with 20%ish immunity from having COVID, add this to some people having natural immunity (we’ve seen households where only one person infected) then that is enough to just slow the spread. No it’s not the 70% plus we need to get rid of the virus but it will slow spread...