Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 19

[BigChocFrenzy]

Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 19

Welcome to thread 19 of the daily updates

Resource links:

Welcome to thread 18 of the daily updates

Resource links:

Uk dashboard deaths, cases, hospitals, tests - 4 nations, English regions & LAs
Imperial UK weekly LAs, cases / 100k, table, map, hotspots
Modelling real number of infections February to date
MSAO Map of English cases
Cases Tracker England Local Government
ONS MSAO Map English deaths
CovidMessenger live update by council district in England
Scot gov Daily data
Scotland TravellingTabby LAs, care homes, hospitals, tests, t&t
PH Wales LAs, tests, ONS deaths
NI Dashboard
Zoe Uk data
UK govt pressers Slides & data
ICNRC Intensive Care National Audit & Research reports
NHS t&t England & UK testing Weekly stats
R estimates UK & English regions
PHE Surveillance report infections & watchlists each Thursday
ONS England infection surveillance report each Friday
Datasets for ONS surveillance reports
ONS Roundup deaths, infections & economic reports
ECDC rolling 14-day incidence EEA & UK
Worldometer UK page
Our World in Data test positivity etc, DIY graphs
FT DIY graphs compare deaths, cases, raw / million pop
Covidly.com world summary & graphs
Alama Personal COVID risk assessment

⏭ Our STUDIES Corner ⏮

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

ONS Dataset for 4-11 September

https://www.ons.gov.uk/file?uri=%2fpeoplepopulationandcommunity%2fhealthandsocialcare%2fconditionsanddiseases%2fdatasets%2fcoronaviruscovid19infectionsurveydata%2f2020/covid19infectionsurveydatasets20200918.xlsx

Age ..... % positive
2-11 .... 0.28%
12-16 .... 0.10%
17-24 .... 0.52%
25-34 ....0.36%
35-49 ....0.12%
50-69 ....0.12%
70+ ....0.06%

As expected, age 17-24 have highest infection rate,
with age 25-34 the next highest

Interesting that age 12-16 have the lowest rate, lower even than age 2-11

Age 70+ (in private households, not care homes) are protected or protecting themselves

You really would think there would be at least a weekly Boris/Scotland/Wales/NI call wouldn’t you.

At least in London I think part of the reason it spread so widely there originally was the tube. Nowhere else has anything quite like that. And according to London friends almost nobody is getting the tube these days. Very high proportion of professionals (which is a LOT of London) just wfh indefinitely. A very different demography to the rest of the UK anyway.

age 12-16 have the lowest rate among under-70s

a week is a long time with exponential growth

Please be careful with statements like this, a reproduction rate of 1.0001 is exponential growth, but after a week there would be pretty much the same number of cases of COVID.

With the higher reproduction rate, then it depends more on how quickly the people become infected and how long, but still over a week, but you'd only expect around double the number of people infected a week later.

Saying exponential always makes people think of very, very rapid growth, but exponential can still be very slow.

The PHE survillence data on deprivation rating is interesting.

In ALL groups the least well off group have the highest level of positive cases. Thats been consistent in ALL but one group.

Until this week 17 - 19 years in the two highest economic groups have had the highest level of infection in their age group and thats only been overtaken this week by the bottom group.

Should be interesting when the universities go back then...

Breaking the 12-16 down from 17-24 isn't all that helpful for schools...

We have large numbers of 17 and 18 years olds : I'd like to know how many of the 17-24 are still in various educational establishments.

Interesting that age 12-16 have the lowest rate, lower even than age 2-11

The hypothesis that family transmission, not school transmission is the primary driver in child infections is supported by that data - because the parents of the 12-16 year olds have rates lower than the parents of the 2-11 year olds.

I would question if it's an artifact of the sampling though, harder to get truculent teenagers to agree to the surveying.

The BRTUS map despite all its foibles does definitely show more 'activity' in primary schools.

This ONS survey should maybe also be taken with another one issued today:

ONS: Coronavirus and the social impacts on Great Britain: 18 September 2020

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/healthandwellbeing/bulletins/coronavirusandthesocialimpactsongreatbritain/18september2020

A controversial viewpoint !
A biting commentary on govt policy, rising figures and causes - I don't agree with his desired strategy, but he has a point here:

Stephen Reicher @ReicherStephen

Todays National Statistics make for very interesting reading.
They confirm the argument that infections are spiking not so much because the public are behaving badly but because they are following bad policy set by the government...

93% of people report wearing facemasks,
81% say they are avoiding physical contact with others,
only 13% of people say they have socialised with more than 10 people
and only 14% of people say they have socialised with more than 2 households.

Most people are following the rules.

By contrast, the proprtion of people working at work has risen to some 60%
while the numbers working from home has halved to some 20%
- even though figures suggest that half of all workplaces are not socially distanced.

Similarly the number of people going out, drinking out and eating out ('to help out') has risen sharply -
eating out from some 10% to nearly 40%.
It has dropped in the last week, but remains much higher than before.

In sum, the numbers getting exposed to infection because they are doing what the Government is telling them to do
vastly outweighs the number being exposed by breaking COVID restrictions.
And yet the Government blames the public for the situation we are now in.

Of course, those who are most flagrantly disobeying the rules are unlikely also to participate in ONS surveys,
or indeed to get tested or isolate

Re: London:

• The infections clearly ballooned from August 24 to Sep 7. The “highest watermark” level of confirmed positive tests was so far reached on Sep 7 - 450 cases (based on the date of specimen). This period would have been picked up by the ONS survey.

• Since then, the increase might have slowed down. The number of reported cases post Sep 10 in London has been stable while North West continued to go up. This might be distorted by problems with testing although based on my personal experience the deficit of tests in London might not be as bad as in the North. All the “worried well” in my office and DD’s school end up getting tested (although finding a slot apparently takes a long time).

• Brent and Ealing went up in the first half of September but right now they seem to be levelling off. The borough that has been on the rise over past few days is Redbridge.

• Of course, there is still a risk London cases will resume ballooning. The next few days - couple of weeks will be critical.

"a week is a long time with exponential growth"

A week is a long time IFF the curve gradient is increasing rapidly,
but not when it is on a mostly horizontal curve moving only very gradually upwards

• the UK is somewhere in the middle of those 2 extremes atm !

That's interesting to know @Whydoyouthinkthatthen
Please post if you notice the ONS questions changing, or new ones being added

Cross posted - the questions may feed into that social impact survey as they are similar but I don't think so as the sample size is much smaller for that one.

I will report if new questions are added. I get asked about contact (physical and non-physical), where I work, do I wear a mask...

That's very interesting from Reicher. I tend to agree with him that the issues are returns to work and the lack of adequate COVOD safeguards in many workplaces and transport.

@BigChocFrenzy

Of course, those who are most flagrantly disobeying the rules are unlikely also to participate in ONS surveys, or indeed to get tested or isolate

Or tell the truth when asked.

Not many people would openly admit to an official that they don't keep to the rules.

Latest R-numbers & Growth rates

For UK:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk#history

R =1.1-1.4

Daily infection growth rate =+2% to +7%
i.e. infections increasing by 2-7% per day on average across the UK

English regional rates:

Midlands looks like fastest growing rates:
with R = 1.2 - 1.5
and Growth rate = +4 to +8% daily

NI

https://www.health-ni.gov.uk/news/current-r-number-estimate-2

R = 1.2
7-day incidence 33.3 / 100,000
7-day test positivity rate (pillar 1 +2) = 1.81 %

Scotland

https://www.gov.scot/binaries/content/documents/govscot/publications/research-and-analysis/2020/09/coronavirus-covid-19-modelling-epidemic-issue-no-18/documents/coronavirus-covid-19-modelling-epidemic-scotland-issue-no-18/coronavirus-covid-19-modelling-epidemic-scotland-issue-no-18/govscot%3Adocument/coronavirus-covid-19-modelling-epidemic-scotland-issue-no-18.pdf

R = 1.1 - 1.4
Growth rate = +1 to +8%

.

And according to London friends almost nobody is getting the tube these days.

Actually, London tube is getting busier and busier. I take it twice a day four or five days a week (I’m still trying to work from home every now and then).

However, most (if not all) of the people wear masks and I think it is making a big difference.

@wintertravel1980

And according to London friends almost nobody is getting the tube these days.

Actually, London tube is getting busier and busier. I take it twice a day four or five days a week (I’m still trying to work from home every now and then).

However, most (if not all) of the people wear masks and I think it is making a big difference.

Agree, the tube is relatively busy now, though I have always been able to get a seat at rush hour so it's not like the nose-in-armpit crowds of olden days.

A week is a long time in exponential growth - and when that is not uniformly distributed only the innumerate look at national figures. The growth rate since the ONS survey is driven by what is happening in the north of the country (test availability permitting) and if anyone thinks that is at the start of an exponential growth curve I suggest they look again.

Secondary seemed to go back a few days later.
Primary more likely to have nursery age sibling so if they do get it they might have from them who will have been in over the summer. And also some will have been to holiday clubs.
Precise ages would be more helpful
Our cold came from 8yo who I guess spent more time in the classroom than 5yo.

@BigChocFrenzy I was quite surprised at the number of younger children in the ONS figures

I'm concerned that both the ONS and Covid-Zoe datasets have limits of usefulness in different ways.
Above we have debate about relative test positivity of 2-11 and 12-19 year olds, based on 87 people swab testing positive from 73 households out of 66717 people from 34090 households. It doesn't include care homes, so has never covered upper age ranges well, and it won't include natural rule-breakers. Expanding the dataset for ONS sounds like a good idea to reduce anomalies, but when we look at covid-Zoe they have been consistently in under-reporting cases. Covid-zoe recently adjusted their algorithm to just randomly make the whole of the north universally the same slightly darker red, which hardly fixes the problem in a way that gives confidence. Neither are close to actual current test results and I would argue both are still under-reporting. I don't know the answer for estimating right now, but curious if anyone else has ideas?