Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 23

[BigChocFrenzy]

Welcome to thread 23 of the daily updates

Resource links:

Uk dashboard deaths, cases, hospitals, tests - 4 nations, English regions & LAs
UK govt pressers Slides & data
R estimates UK & English regions
Imperial UK weekly LAs, cases / 100k, table, map, hotspots
School statistics Attendance
Modelling real number of UK infections February to date
NHS England Hospital activity
NHs England Daily deaths
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
ICNRC Intensive Care National Audit & Research reports
NHS t&t England & UK testing Weekly stats
PHE Surveillance reports & LA Local Watchlist Maps by LSOA
ONS England infection surveillance report each Friday
Datasets for ONS surveillance reports
ONS Roundup deaths, infections & economic reports
Zoe Uk data
ECDC rolling 14-day incidence EEA & UK
Worldometer UK page
Our World in Data GB test positivity etc, DIY country graphs
FT DIY graphs compare deaths, cases, raw / million pop
Alama Personal COVID risk assessment
Local Mobility Reports for countries
UK Highstreet Tracker for cities & large towns Footfall, spend index, workers, visitors, economic recovery

⏭ Our STUDIES Corner ⏮

We welcome factual, data driven and analytical contributions
Please try to keep discussion focused on these
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The whole point of pubs is too meet folks you don't live with so if that happens more pubs will die I'm not going to pay more for a drink if I'm just sitting there with my household. I might go to a restaurant with my household but rarely just for a drink.

They won't be closing schools so that's been a deliberate omission from the data.

Which is a shame as personally I'd like the country to know the risks teachers are taking.

When the local hospitality industry in Newcastle actually said they'd prefer a circuit break for 2 weeks as yes, the no mingling with another household is more damaging to trade.

Herd immunity and overshoot.

As I understand it ‘overshoot’ refers to the process whereby infections trundle on like a supertanker in the community past the ~40% level or whatever with no intervention or previous experience, whereas vaccines create a ‘wall’ that the virus can’t easily jump over.

Surely a second wave With SD would have less of an overshoot?

They won't be closing schools so that's been a deliberate omission from the data.Which is a shame as personally I'd like the country to know the risks teachers are taking.

Agreed, but also there is a lot they COULD do to reduce transmission chains in schools. Better bespoke testing for schools (onsite saliva testing etc); testing close contacts of positive cases to see how it could be spreading asymptomatically and to gauge how each case spreads outwards (or not) which would allow heads to make better decisions about when to close bubbles; masks from age 6, or just all the time in secondary; using community spaces for SD where possible; extra money for extra TAs so those schools with space can do more SD. There are so many things - I'd be a fan of just giving headteachers more money for coronavirus risk reduction and let them decide - my DD1s school was really creative and clever in June/July but they need the cash.

I think they're risking a backlash if they do something to harm already suffering businesses without doing any of the above when closing hospitality will cause a minimal effect (and may even push some socialising into non SD venues like homes).

I think they're risking a backlash if they do something to harm already suffering businesses without doing any of the above when closing hospitality will cause a minimal effect (and may even push some socialising into non SD venues like homes).

I agree. I hoped that by the autumn the rapid-antigen testing would be more widely available for schools, travel and business. I wrote some patient information for a private provider offering 15 minute point-of-care nasal swab tests- but the quick tests have been frustratingly slow to roll out generally.

Ilove, I fully agree, we teachers are sadly used to having to put up with lack of funds and so difficult teaching conditions. Education is not as much of a priority as they like to pretend.

If there's one thing the pandemic highlights it's class sizes in the U.K. compared to the EU, which is entirely about grassroots funding.

I think UK reluctance to use rapid tests is a big mistake.

It is, of course, true that all the existing rapid tests are less sensitive than the proper PCR tests and will inevitably result in a higher number of false negatives. However, if we go back to the brilliant article in Atlantic on k-factor (that was referenced here a few times), we do not need to identify every single positive case. The most effective method of dealing with the pandemic is backward tracing and identification of recent clusters. Missing several positives will not materially impact the R rate - missing a cluster / super spreading event will. Speed is in fact more important than accuracy.

It is disappointing UK keeps striving for test perfection (or, in fact, maximum accuracy since even PCR tests are very far from perfect) instead of balancing risks and aiming for a pragmatic approach.

Interestingly, as I understand, Italy is using rapid testing along with PCR and their numbers are so far looking better than ours.

Education is not as much of a priority as they like to pretend.

I think Education is only a priority for two reasons:

1. Getting parents back to work
2. It sounds good virtuous. Remember "education, education, education"...

If they close hospitality, they do need to put some financial support in place.
Hospitality venues are already struggling, they're going to continue to struggle. With social distancing you can fit around 25% of the normal number of people in a room, and places are finding they can save money by zooming meetings etc.
Our venue we had 6 days (9am-10pm) a week of 75% of the rooms filled most of the time. We now have one evening when we're about that, and the rest of the time we're all but empty.

Apologies that this is from The Sun 🤦🏼‍♀️

No idea where they got their cut off figures from

But it was just discussed on Jeremy Vine.... thought on the cut off of what makes green amber red?

www.thesun.co.uk/news/12877052/lockdown-tier-england-coronvirus-risk-areas/

@SarahMused

The situation in Sweden is a lot more nuanced than people realise. They had a very mild flu season prior to covid arriving (as did the UK). All cause mortality this year is not exceptional and lower than several of its neighbours that are frequently lauded for their approach to tackling covid. This makes me think that they may have been counting covid deaths in a more inclusive way. The other argument I often see when Sweden is mentioned is population density. However more Swedes live in cities than do in the UK. *@HaroldOfW* on twitter has been a great follow for getting the Swedish perspective on their measures. The chart below shows all cause mortality in Sweden over the last few years. The year that stands out is 2019 which is much lower with a return to more normal levels this year.

.... It's difficult to "nuance" Covid deaths that are 5-12 x deaths / million of their Scandi neighbours who did lock down It is logical that the UK without lockdown would have experienced very much higher total deaths than currently

The UK lockdown followed seeing how N Italy's health system - normally with more spare capacity than the NHS - became overwhelmed

Sweden are counting the same as other countries, or - like Belgium who count any sniff of Covid even without a positive test - they would have stated this on their public health site or in an official statement
Those on the hard right flooding social media with praise of Sweden's policy - just not their policies of socialism ! - would be shouting this from the rooftop

All other plots I've seen of total deaths for Sweden and other countries show this hump of COVID deaths above the curves of total deaths in previous years
e.g. attached from FT

Rather than trying to deny the much higher deaths, there are many arguments in favour of the Swedish approach - the reasons the authorities there chose:

.Civil liberties - aversion / concern about giving government additional powers
.Alienation of government and people
.Very high number of single adult households - specific to Sweden
.That high number of such households would make lockdown far more damaging socially & economically than elsewhere
. Low population density would achieve herd immunity more slowly / manageably and at a lower level than other countries - specific to Sweden

Totally agree, even if the sensitivity/specificity is a little lower, the speed would hopefully improve compliance and improve the ability to track and trace.

If you may have to wait days for results, it's tempting to ignore a tickle.

Agreed too

Rapid testing kits may not yet be in mass production - anyone know timing ? - but would increase acceptance & effectiveness

Backward tracing is now being advocated by many experts
e.g. Merkel's chief virologist, Drosten - so probably t&t has / will include that here

Liverpool is likely to run out of hospital beds first.

And soon.

amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/08/hospitals-in-north-of-england-to-run-out-of-covid-beds-within-a-week?__twitter_impression=true&fbclid=IwAR3Fw50yYA4goWDNc-v5_CPgSlLfZLHr2MKpXRHDKTj0CIq5qRL7O-dIPs8
Hospitals in north of England ‘to run out of Covid beds within a week’

Health chiefs warn they plan to ditch routine surgery as second wave seriously disrupts NHS

.

I've seen a different cut-off at 100+ tier 2, even higher tier 3. Looks like the random numbers brigade are out guessing.

The BBC has the supposed sensitive slides linked without numbers but with the detailed restrictions, I can't copy a link to PDF but if you Google "BBC Covid-19 Proposed Social Distancing Framework" then it should come up.

A rapid "bedside" test for coronavirus could help cut the spread of the infection in hospitals

www.bbc.com/news/health-54468993

@MRex yes I was surprised those numbers seemed lower than I had thought they would be.... especially as it took the whole of London into red and a lot of the Home Counties and surrounding.

Does anyone know if it’s possible to see the %age positive tests in my local area? As in my town like littleowl1s emails rather than north west/south east etc type of breakdown? I’m shocked my local area has tripled in a week and would like to know what the %age positive rate is.

New ONS Social impacts report: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/healthandwellbeing/datasets/coronavirusandthesocialimpactsongreatbritaindata

@MRex

https://downloads.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/english/covid-19proposeddsocialdistancinggframeworkbriefingg_aid.pdf

Yes I had seen that. Will be interesting to see how close that is to what actually happens

@Reastie

Does anyone know if it’s possible to see the %age positive tests in my local area? As in my town like littleowl1s emails rather than north west/south east etc type of breakdown? I’m shocked my local area has tripled in a week and would like to know what the %age positive rate is.

There isnt a source im aware of.

@RedToothBrush
Yes but there is a big difference between running out of Covid beds and running out of all beds. Unfortunately cancelling routine stuff will free up a lot of beds. Not that that’s a good prospect.
There was a stat floating round yesterday- 4% of all hospital beds in the NW are taken up by Covid patients. The figure is 2% nationally. So it’s not at all the case (yet) that that hospitals are “full” of Covid patients

Reastie. Same, we have gone from 10/100,000 to 50 in a little over a week.

@Reastie My local council gives a positive rate in a weekly video announcement so you could check if yours does something similar. Our rates have gone up a lot from a rate of about 1.2% a few weeks ago to just over 5% this week.