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?

I'm thinking a lot is to do with employment with more factories and processing plants further North. Are more people further South still working from home?

Whatever the reason, now that schools have returned I feel the Southern counties will soon be back up to the higher levels seen elsewhere. London boroughs are seeing worrying jumps in cases.

I live just outside London, and everyone I know was ill in December to March. We had a spike in care homes and hospitals early April, local hospitals were overwhelmed and two stopped admissions temporarily.

We're much quieter now, it seems that anyone who was going to catch it has already had it tbh.

I'd just assumed that it was working it's way up the country, and that lockdown only owed it's progress.

@DonaldTrumpsChopper

I live just outside London, and everyone I know was ill in December to March. We had a spike in care homes and hospitals early April, local hospitals were overwhelmed and two stopped admissions temporarily.

We're much quieter now, it seems that anyone who was going to catch it has already had it tbh.

I'd just assumed that it was working it's way up the country, and that lockdown only owed it's progress.

Agree with this, London and the South East has a very high population and still we aren't seeing anything like Northern towns. Just like the virus was high in other countries, we were behind Spain and Italy by a week or so..... the North would have been even further away. Maybe herd immunity is playing some part, time will tell. New York was hit badly as another example but seem to be doing ok right now.

I am from the North but live about 40 miles outside London. So many people were ill from January to March but very few were tested. I strongly believe that the lockdown was pointless for London and the SE as it was too late and it just slowed down the spread to the rest of the country, which is why we see the North South divide now.

Recently, I’ve watched it slowly spread on the app from the north. First it was Manchester, then Birmingham started to grow in cases, then down to Worcester. I’m just on the edge outside Worcester and I’m waiting for it to spread further. I think eventually it will all pretty much be dark red. Sorry for the pessimistic response!
I remember when the map was nearly all pale pink. ☹️

www.centreforcities.org/blog/where-are-the-most-vulnerable-cities-in-the-uk-coronavirus/
Article from April

It shows a map of the country by most vulnerable community by several measures.

The map of current cases is largely reflecting the pre-existing health inequality...

The Zoe App is statistically utter bollocks
it is voluntary to download.
More people are reporting through it in the New Forest (popn 70,000) than in Southampton (popn 300,000)
cos people are sheeple and follow their friends.

I would NEVER base a health decision on that app

@ListeningQuietly

The Zoe App is statistically utter bollocks it is voluntary to download. More people are reporting through it in the New Forest (popn 70,000) than in Southampton (popn 300,000) cos people are sheeple and follow their friends.

I would NEVER base a health decision on that app

Had this discussion with a friend.

Its unrepresentative. It will be used by people in certain demographics but not others.

Its more likely to overrepresent older white middle class educated people who value information and data and to underrepresent younger working class less educated people who really couldn't give a fuck about this boring shit.

It therefore misses a massive amount of really important information. It is highly unreliable and under the current circumstances is taking away precious resources which are needed as the system is struggling to cope with basic demands.

I really want to strangle all the people who have posted 'zoe is telling me to get a test even though I haven't got the three symptoms' and all the trite about it being important research. The inability to miss the point about what the priority right now is and how taking a test when not clinically indicated has implications.

Quite honestly, its primarily an app to make people who don't really understand data but think its important feel better about the situation rather than being something considerable more significant than that.

@Realitea

Recently, I’ve watched it slowly spread on the app from the north. First it was Manchester, then Birmingham started to grow in cases, then down to Worcester. I’m just on the edge outside Worcester and I’m waiting for it to spread further. I think eventually it will all pretty much be dark red. Sorry for the pessimistic response! I remember when the map was nearly all pale pink. ☹️

It was only a few days ago when a lot of it was pale pink. Pale pink is the new 'when I were a lass this were all green fields' (sic)

@RedToothBrush I agree with what you said about the type of people who probably use the Zoe app.

We are a few weeks behind Spain. They had one of the most severe of all lockdowns and yet cases are back up to 10k a day some days. Worst still, they have had 400 deaths in the last 2 days and 1/5 hospital beds are now taken by Covid patients in Madrid. This is heading our way again and in 3/4 weeks time could easily be us. The government don’t want any more lockdowns so it is survival of the fittest.

@RedToothBrush I have been told to get a test by the Zoe app three times now. One was backache caused by gardening, one was an "off" tummy which lasted less than 24 hours and the third I can't even remember! I didn't bother for any as it seemed a waste of a test

I am in a Northern town which features highly on the deprivation indices on your link and never cease to be amazed at the number of idiots in the Covid is a scam, I don't have to wear a mask, government rules don't apply to me, etc camp. I am actually starting to feel quite unsafe going out because of the buggers, I work in the NHS and feel safer at work than outside!

I was just reading earlier about the serious shortage of tests in London.

Also that the authorities expect London to be hit by a bad second wave in a matter of weeks.

Funnily enough despite reporting London's cases as individual boroughs, any curfew or other restrictions will be London-wide. Because, like I've been saying, London is very interlinked.

Think London's cases are low? Even with a testing shortage, look at the figures for all the boroughs. Add together and you get the real picture of the number of cases in an interconnected city. Hint. It's not low.

@ssd

It's interesting how this spreads North eventually. I was quite smug, being in Scotland, thinking our numbers were low, but not now.

I'd really query the accuracy of this. Grampian, highlands and tayside have much less cases than Glasgow and the west.

@SheepandCow

I was just reading earlier about the serious shortage of tests in London.

Also that the authorities expect London to be hit by a bad second wave in a matter of weeks.

Funnily enough despite reporting London's cases as individual boroughs, any curfew or other restrictions will be London-wide. Because, like I've been saying, London is very interlinked.

Think London's cases are low? Even with a testing shortage, look at the figures for all the boroughs. Add together and you get the real picture of the number of cases in an interconnected city. Hint. It's not low.

I agree with regard to the reporting of cases in London. It's clear from some posts here that some people have a false sense of security thinking London will be ok this time. It's happening now and again we are seem as unprepared as ever. Back in August there were reports that the Government held a meeting to put in place procedures to use the m25 to ring fence London in the event of cases rising exponentially again. Back then it never really made headlines and no one took much notice (apart from Sadiq who was not invited) as we were bathed in a heatwave and pushing Covid to the back of our minds. If it does happens lockdown is going to be very hard over the Winter months.

@mrshoho Yes that's the danger. Luring people into a false sense of security. It happened in March too. Insistence that London was 'well equipped' to cope, that it wouldn't be hard hit, etc. Ended up being the worse hit in the country with over 6,000 deaths and hospitals at capacity. It was inevitable because of the sheer numbers of people living there - so many tightly packed together. Several boroughs have some of the highest levels of deprivation in the whole country, with huge amounts of overcrowded housing. Then there's the mass movement. 500,000 students are arriving this month from across the UK and beyond. And there's Heathrow.

It was ridiculous excluding the Sadiq Khan from the meetings. A pandemic should be beyond politics. Like him or not, he's the democratically elected mayor.

I'd love to be wrong this time round. Perhaps there really is more immunity and more caution being practiced there. We'll find out in the coming month or two.

I'm in south west. Obviously we have had covid cases and less, but at the lower end compared to many areas.

Every day there seems to be people on mumsnet who clearly thinking restrictions don't apply to them (have to admit I don't know where they individually live) and the government are saying it's mainly down to social interaction.

Here the odd groups think restrictions don't apply to them, mainly younger ones not wearing masks going into shops in groups and hanging around the town centre, but we do have a high uptake of following restrictions. Teenagers are seeing eachother in parks in small groups, SD is very apparent especially in my immediate area, mini queues still outside supermarkets to clean trolleys and sanitize (noticably worse this morning so obviously we don't need to be told to be more careful). Socialising is being done outside by us, neighbours, work colleagues (only had my SIL for 10 mins as it was pelting with rain and she was dropping off present) etc. The largest get together we've had was meeting BIL's family (seven) at a pub, we had two separate tables with distance between. As so many are living like this, surely it must be helping with keeping numbers low.

@RedToothBrush
'It therefore misses a massive amount of really important information. It is highly unreliable and under the current circumstances is taking away precious resources which are needed as the system is struggling to cope with basic demands.'

I agree it is unrepresentative however what a lot of people don't appreciate is how small the sample size is for the ONS data. This is based on a survey of 8,000 people across the UK, so on average they have only sampled 23 people in each local authority.

The zoe data is based on over 4 million users and looking at the local authorities on the map they are getting data from around 3000 to 15000 contributors. Yes these contibutors may be biased to white middle class but this data needs to be viewed in comination with the ONS data to give greater local level insight.

@Torvean32
'I'd really query the accuracy of this. Grampian, highlands and tayside have much less cases than Glasgow and the west'

This is shown in the app. As of today
Number of active cases (estimated):
Grampian: 251
Highlands: 306
Tayside (Angus): 113
Glasgow: 986

Data is only valuable if you understand its flaws and why its important (and when its not important)

It ultimately doesn't change the answer to all the people currently posting

'should i get a test cos zoey told me to?'

From being anything other than

'no dont be a utter bellend'

And it still doesn't make Zoey anything more than an app from the 'worried well' if people are making decisions based from it without asking the fundamental question of

'what data is missing here?'

It can show its autumn and lots of people are getting coughs more than they did in June. And it can should how many affluent people can get hold of tests even if they wouldn't otherwise have got one.

But im not sure its value is significantly more than that. Of course people doing it will argue the toss but thats kind of my point too.

@redtoothbrush Yes of course you need to look at what data is missing with any data source. Generally policy makers will consider data from multiple sources in light of their different limitations.

I agree when tests are sparce we don't want to waste them on people who are told to get checked out by the app becuase of unrelated symptoms.

However I do feel rhe zoe app has actually been pretty useful in getting a more detailed understanding of the wide variation in covid symptoms and there was discussion on radio 4 this morning that this information could be used to better target testing. For example the app has found:

• School children with snotty noses are highly unlikely to have covid and tests should not be wasted on them
• In middle aged people a loss of taste and smell is a key symptom (this was only added to the nhs symptom list at the end of the 1st wave following info from zoe and others)
• headaches and fatigue are key symptoms but not on the nhs list

In the future it would be really beneficial to be able to enter your demographics and symptoms in an app and then those most at risk for covid could be prioritised for testing.

I’m in the Home Counties. We (and London) were bit much harder in the first peak, so it would be interesting to see if there is greater immunity down here.

I would say a greater proportion of people in jobs that are still wfh - so less chance of catching. 40 per cent of my town commute into London for work (before Covid). The trains are dead every morning.

Assuming you are even eligible (the ‘self-employed eg deliveroo and yodel drivers don’t even qualify) then self isolating on £95 a week is an economic impossibility for many households. Add in greater housing density and higher levels of obesity and poor health. This is a virus that feeds on economic deprivation.

I think this map is totally misleading . I look at the travelling tabby website and his figures don’t seem to me to resemble these figures in any way.

Interesting article in the Guardian on this. GreenGoldRed agrees with your point about working from home:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/sep/14/working-from-home-covid-19-london-uk-capital-white-collar-work