Why has the North been hit harder?

[Desperado40]

Does anyone know why covid rates are rising higher in some areas and not others? My understanding is that big cities/higher density of population is a big factor, but this is just a guess. In that case, why was it Bolton, Manchester etc and not London?
This is a genuine question that I'd like to find some answers to.

I know London is diverse. I live here. But there are more non Londoners (not born here, elsewhere in the UK and the World) than in other places. Many born in London have been forced to move away too. I’m also a northerner. No bias or ignorance on the north or London.

Most colleagues and friends grew up elsewhere or commuted quite far. Few were local and born in London. If you worked in Leeds or Bolton it would be the other way around. You can’t deny that reality.

@ShastaBeast
I agree. Many many Londoners have been forced out, away from their families and friends. And lots of people currently living in London have moved there from other parts of the UK. But still millions of Londoners were born there and remain there close to their families. London has over one million pensioners. Many are born and bred Londoners. They still (for now) exist. Of those not born there but from abroad, many came as whole families, who have settled close to each other. Plenty of families and friends do still live near each other in London. But I do agree with you. London families and communities have been more shattered than in many other parts of the UK.

It's all those bloody ferrets and whippets

Absolutely no stereotyping on this thread 😁

The only person I've ever met who had a whippet (lovely dogs btw) was a Londoner.

Ferrets just make me think of Draco Malfoy from Harry Potter rather than the North.

Australia and Brazil suffered badly in June and july because it was their winter.

Australia closed its borders, and later its state borders, and quarantined return travelers, and set up an excellent track and trace system - a few notable bungles were made, with tragic effect, but overall deaths are not high compared to elsewhere. (3 deaths per 100,000)

Brazil is led by a sociopath and fared far less well. (65 per 100,000)

The UK's pandemic death rate is close to that of Brazil (62 per 100,000). And that was achieved over warmer months.

Autumn/Winter is said to be a part of it, largely because people are indoors in closer quarters together for greater lengths of time, I think.

I was talking to some friends about this?

We wondered if it was just that central London had more diversity and ethnicity, and poverty, similar to some places like Bolton and Manchester. More so than some areas of the SE say Kent and Sussex?

Poverty. Lower standard of living. More health conditions because of that standard of living. More obesity. More nationalities and groups if ethnicity. More religion and groups that have a closer community to celebrate that religion. Or getting together for eid etc.

We have very low cases here in SE, and no school closures. We are just trying to work out why!?

There’s rule breaking nearly everywhere, London will no doubt catch up but a lot of the people in London are commuters and working from home.

People talking about herd immunity, we know that you can now get it more than once, so how does that fit with the notion of herd immunity

You can get this disease again, although there is some immunity after having it for a few months and those that have been reported as having it a 2nd time, it seems to be a much more milder to asymptomatic illness.

From what I have read there is a certain amount of people who will get infected and lock downs are only delaying the inevitable/allowing there to be enough beds and ventilators to give everyone as much chance to survive.

The harsher the lockdown the higher the curve when lockdown is over.

I think we will go into another national lock down but hopefully not for a few weeks and only for a short time.

I am from an area where the infection rate is over a 10th of places that have/are going into more lockdowns and is falling.

Maybe those that got it in March,April, May will continue to be immune for another few months and will not be able to get the infection when it returns South so it doesn’t get spread around the community to the same extent.

Actually there are some London boroughs with a very similar pattern of infection to places in the north on local lockdown. The overall rate in London is being pulled down by large populous boroughs like Sutton and Bromley where infection rates are lower. Where my brother and sister in law live (inner London, very mixed in terms of wealth and health), they are on mini 'lockdown lite' and are being encouraged not to mix households indoors. This was before the Rule of 6 was was brought in nationally.

[quote GrapeSodas]This page is useful for seeing the rates of areas at different times since the start. You can enter the council lower down to see a graph of the rates. www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/20/coronavirus-uk-map-confirmed-covid-cases-and-deaths-today[/quote]
Surely the question has to be what is the difference between those areas who are actually showing a fall, or very tiny (certainly not exponential) growth, and those showing massive growth.

I live on the Essex/Suffolk border, and can see Essex has a 0.25% increase over the week while Suffolk has a 44.9% decrease. These numbers play out in where I live, my district has been fairly stable over the last couple of weeks, generally 0 or 1 case a day. We did a spike of 3 a couple days ago, which I would imagine was a family, which put us from reducing to increasing. (Can't believe that I'm saying 3 is a spike), but are still at 4.8/100000. Neighbouring town (Colchester) is currently at 6.7/100000, which is a drop. While neighbouring district in Suffolk is 2.2/100000 (down from 7.6).

Now I understand that my district is fairly rural, but where I live is a small town with 2 villages that seem to have recently blended in to it. But I've also noticed a high level of compliance, yes we have our idiots. But mostly everyone gives people space, wears masks if they can and our local schools haven't seen the drop-off congregating that I've seen in the papers.

There's a difference between an increase in a sparsely populated area and an increase in a densely populated city. Viruses spread fast and infect more people in the latter.

I've said on a different thread. It's deja vu re London. Right up until the point that thousands were dying in London, way more than anywhere else, people were insisting it wouldn't be hit as hard as elsewhere. The same is happening now.

The denial will continue until it's impossible to try. Then it will be a shoulder shrug and a well of course it was going to be bad there.

Sadiq Khan knows this and wants to stop it happening again. Whether he can succeed or not when he's up against people determined ro thwart his efforts remains to be seen. Time is running out.

Boroughs like Bromley do seem to be pulling the average down right now. However I'd be cautious about accuracy. We know there's a nationwide test shortage, and certainly during the first wave Bromley was one of the top ten worse hit areas for a while. It saw hundreds of deaths.

I’m in an area of the south that was badly hit early on. As a result everyone personally knew of someone who had it and as such there had been (Fairly) good compliance with the rules. Or at least people being careful.

Those areas that didn’t see this before the first lockdown ( according to friends and family who live there) are less likely to feel the need to comply...

More people break rules? I don’t know. I’m in the south west. Maybe we do just have more space and less cities?