Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 25

[BigChocFrenzy]

Welcome to thread 25 of the daily updates

Resource links

UK:
Uk dashboard R, deaths, cases, hospitals, tests - by postcode, 4 nations, English regions, LAs
Interactive 7-day rolling cases map click on map or by postcode
UK govt pressers Slides & data
SAGE Table Interventions with impacts and R
Imperial UK weekly tables & extrapolations LAs, cases / 100k, table, map, hotspots
School statistics Attendance - Tuesdays
ICNRC Intensive Care National Audit & Research reports
UK testing and NHS England track & trace - Thursdays
ONS Roundup deaths, infections & economic reports
ONS England, Wales & NI Infection surveillance report - Fridays
ONS Datasets for surveillance reports
Our World in Data UK test positivity
R estimates & daily growth UK & English regions - Fridays
Modelling real number of UK infections February in first wave

England:
NHS England Hospital activity
NHS England Daily deaths
PHE COVID Clinical Risk Factors Non-respiratory by region, area, district etc
MSAO Map of English cases
Cases Tracker England Local Government
PHE surveillance reports Covid, flu, respiratory diseases - Thursdays
CovidMessenger live update by council district in England

Scotland, Wales, NI:
Scot gov Daily data
Scotland TravellingTabby LAs, care homes, hospitals, tests, t&t
PH Wales LAs, tests, ONS deaths
NI Dashboard

Miscell:
Zoe Uk data
ECDC rolling 14-day incidence EEA & UK
Worldometer UK page
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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Links added to OP:

• SAGE Table of Interventions with impacts and R
• PHE COVID Clinical Risk Factors by region, area

Links changed

• PHE Covid surveillance is now Covid & flu

To clarify, middle school covers years 5-9. So age 9-14.

@lonelyplanet - the ONS age bands were updated in the most recent report and does now reflect the institutions. You can view it here: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/englandwalesandnorthernireland9october2020#age-analysis-of-the-number-of-people-in-england-who-had-covid-19.

Yes, that may all be true. So how about Elmbridge? It's not making news, but also Tier 3, and in the most expensive, high earning, low density, high sunshine, highest life expectancy in the country. No universities either. Same issue as Richmond? No idea.

It is a near enough identical region in demographics to Richmond, other than not having a focal point of socialising (so it's less likely to be people super spreading events in pubs wine bars)

In cities like Liverpool and Manchester there is a more underlying problem where the lockdown early on was not so effective because there was a lack of acceptance of the severity of the virus.

I am bang in the middle of those areas with dh working in Liverpool. There was very high compliance during the national lockdown. The streets were very quiet and anyone openly flouting the rules were berated often publicly on social media.
It is the local lockdowns that have had low compliance. I think this is a mixture of anger over Cummings which a pivotal moment for compliance, fatigue and an increasing number of conspiracy theories and covid deniers.

@Baaaahhhhh

EducatingArti I think your view is a bit simplistic. It may also be due to: Higher proportion in poor standard high density housing Higher proportion in public facing key worker roles Lower overall health levels ( maybe including levels of vit D?) etc

Yes, that may all be true. So how about Elmbridge? It's not making news, but also Tier 3, and in the most expensive, high earning, low density, high sunshine, highest life expectancy in the country. No universities either. Same issue as Richmond? No idea.

I'm struggling with what is going on there.

I'm sure it was a typo but Elmbridge is now tier 2

www.elmbridge.gov.uk/news/covid-19-update/

I’m positively surprised that the ‘continue as now’ scenario is 19,000 covid deaths by the end of the year. That is in the realms of flu levels, where we do not lockdown.

I don't think this is right. I have looked at the ONS data about flu deaths and it really isn't that high. People sometimes quote 2017-18 where there were estimated to be ~50,000 excess deaths but relatively few of those were due to flu.

I do think there has been a generalised lazy continuation of the 1980s esque mythologization of the North which isn't now useful. The disobedient working class northerners is not a helpful stereotype. It smacks of assuming the working classes/the Northerners are by nature more feckless. The government neds to handle this with great care.

Not accusing specific posters of this!

@TheMShip
I agree with you.

@MRex have there been released random samples (not targeted testing) from September onwards with numbers positivity in age groups?
And also how many of school age are now doing random testing, as I've heard a couple of people saying their family was doing it, but the children now don't as they come to collect it during school hours.

I don't think age group samples from April to July is a fair representative of how younger children get it as they would be disproportionally less likely to go out of the house. Shopping, work, would both be adults pretty much entirely, and not many were in school. You would expect them to be very much lower.

Using evidence and research from April through to July and applying that to children/schools now is an extrapolation that concerns me as things are so clearly different.

It may be that the data analysts are looking at the data and it's exactly what they expect, ie children low, little risk, so don't see the point in separating it out with fear of confusing Jo Public with too much information.
Or it could be pressure on them to hide the information. As we all know, hiding something with statistics is easy enough to do.

The problem is that without the data we don't know which one it is. The chances are it's the former, but things aren't totally adding up to me from what I am seeing both locally and in other areas, which is why I'm uncomfortable about it.

Unfortunately it isn't something that it doesn't matter if they are wrong, nor if they realise things have gone wrong can be corrected and have an immediate effect, which is why things need to be constantly assessed.

PrayingandHoping. Oooops . Yes, typo.

Single digit millions taken together will add up to tens and low hundreds of million but not to tens of billions. That isn't how arithmetic works, single digit millions can add up to billions. The fact is £12bn has been handed to private contractors/consultants whatever and it could have gone to the NHS, local govt, PHE or feeding hungry kids and many people believe that would have produced far better results.

@MRex I missed those graphs thank you. However age 2 to Year 6 is still not helpful as a group of those children are not in school and are physically very different. Many 9, 10 and 11 year olds are going through puberty and have very different social interactions away from their families than pre school children.

Please could anyone help me understand with the map linked to the dashboard? In my area it currently says cases are now over 100 on the 7 day rolling average, but according to Littleowls emails they are at about 85. Is this something to do with the lag in dtaes?

@Witchend - data has been posted in this thread by others, it's just getting drowned out again by the commentary.
Look at slide 5, it simply isn't possible to add up enough 10-16 cases to get the issue described, even if the positivity rate were that age and not uni students:
Cases: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/926847/Weekly_COVID-19_and_Influenza_Surveillance_Graphs_W42.pdf
Positivity rate: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/926848/Weekly_Influenza_and_COVID19_report_data_W42.xlsx
Manchester cases:
Https:assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/927105/greater-manchester-dcmo-brief.pdf

The data isn't being hidden because it's bad, attempts are being made to show there is a HUGE issue for age group 16-24. Massive. Enormous. Needs attention. Should not be drowned out by chatter about primary schools.

Tier 3 Lancashire, gyms staying open
https://www.lancs.live/news/lancashire-news/lancashire-tier-3-lockdown-deal-19113929.amp?twitterimpression=true

Could be highly concerning

The UK’s largest scheme for tracking the spread of the coronavirus is at risk of providing a misleading picture of the epidemic, as a growing share of people invited to take part fail to return any test results. The Office for National Statistics’ infection survey launched in April to randomly sample thousands of homes in England, and later Wales and Northern Ireland, to estimate how many people are infected with the coronavirus each week. The government’s top scientific advisers consider it the gold standard for measuring the state of the epidemic, because other methods such as testing can miss many cases.

However, the proportion of invited households in England that returned at least one swab has fallen from 51 per cent to just 5 per cent. That has sparked concerns the survey could become biased. If the tests are only being returned by a certain group of people, it may become less reflective of the wider population and the true state of infections.

www.newscientist.com/article/2256942-exclusive-concerns-raised-about-vital-uk-covid-19-infection-survey/?utm_source=nsday&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NSDAY_161020

"In the grand scheme of things, 1.5mm is a drop in the ocean of total COVID spending. " It may be but it's a drop that has been wasted and every drop means more to pay for in future. It's also not the only example that suggests increasing corruption in government with money going to cronies or directed to the private sector when the public sector is more efficient. Small bits have leaked re PPE purchasing that suggests an equal scandal there.

In one of the last briefings either Whitty or Van Tam mentioned 16+ as an issue. The failure to mandate masks for 16+ in schools is another example of government incompetence. If older students were wearing masks it would then become acceptable for younger children who wished to do so to wear them.

We dont have any data on compliance but there is, on the studies thread, evidence that mask use results in less infection. There is also evidence on which police forces hand out fines. I remember in the early days of the epidemic the Devon and Cornwall police being very strict on enforcement and that may have as much to do with their low levels as the excuses re lower density and deprivation. I've also seen one today about hand washing, will try to find that again.

And as an aside - still no-one in government willing to mention vitamin D.

@alreadytaken

We dont have any data on compliance but there is, on the studies thread, evidence that mask use results in less infection. There is also evidence on which police forces hand out fines. I remember in the early days of the epidemic the Devon and Cornwall police being very strict on enforcement and that may have as much to do with their low levels as the excuses re lower density and deprivation. I've also seen one today about hand washing, will try to find that again.

And as an aside - still no-one in government willing to mention vitamin D.

Some support from Matt Hancock yesterday. inews.co.uk/news/politics/vitamin-d-supplements-recommended-matt-hancock-covid-19-725284

Barts are recruiting for a big trial too.

@alreadytaken agree and also zinc. Watched Dr Campbell's videos on zinc today, very interesting.

@TheSunIsStillShining - that article is misusing statistics abysmally, though it gets more honest towards the end. This is the actual ONS data on response rates, see table 4: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/englandwalesandnorthernireland9october2020.
The original respondents continue to reply, 51% of them. The process of expanding testing to add more households is taking time, as they aren't all responding, but the process involves randomly selecting addresses and names, explaining the process, reassuring it's real, booking in etc etc. If you look week by week, it is increasing (and was always described as being a long process to build up).

As we've discussed before, both ONS and Covid-Zoe suffer from responder bias. People won't take part who really won't isolate, don't agree covid is real, have no English language skills, live in a care home and all the myriad other non-response reasons. The limitations of the ONS survey are real, they just haven't changed, which is what the article implies.

Look at slide 5, it simply isn't possible to add up enough 10-16 cases to get the issue described, even if the positivity rate were that age and not uni students:

That's true, but it doesn't meant there's not a data gap.

I suspect the testing of asymptomatic university students may have something to do with this. As we know, large proportions of asymptomatic students found positive in all universities doing their own testing.

No asymptomatic close contacts at all tested in schools.

My 6yo was invited to take part in the ONS.
I didn't respond as we have previously taken part in a flu vaccine study which involved monthly swabs of all the family. The kids found it horrible and painful and started refusing. Their choice.
But it means I want to keep my DD from the tests unless I really have to.

I remember in the early days of the epidemic the Devon and Cornwall police being very strict on enforcement

As were Lancashire police. But they're about to head in to tier 3 as well.

It's also not the only example that suggests increasing corruption in government with money going to cronies or directed to the private sector when the public sector is more efficient.

Public sector could not/cannot provide sufficient supply when time is of essence. The government had no choice but to reach out to private laboratories and throw money at the problem back in March and April when we were looking to expand our testing capacity from 10,000 to 100,000 tests a day.

Out of £12bln spend earmarked for "test and trace" the most expensive component is in fact testing (drive in/walk through centres/mobile units/use of private laboratories/etc). Clearly there was plenty of money wasted because the whole process was set up at the last minute through multiple fire drills but we were operating in a state of emergency.

I was born and grew up in a country that is widely known for corruption of its political elite. When I look at the UK, I primarily see poor planning, rushed decisions and incompetence both in the government and high PHE ranks. I do not see genuine "corruption".

Oh and that was with a trained experienced senior nurse coming round to do the swabs (nasal and throat). I would hate to do it myself to her on a regular basis.