Data & analysis thread, started 1 December

[NoGoodPunsLeft]

New thread!

Link to previous:

Data and analysis thread, started 12 November www.mumsnet.com/Talk/coronavirus/4077794-data-and-analysis-thread-started-12-november

a slightly different way at looking at the seven day moving average in England. This takes Councils in Tiers 2 and Tier 3, splits each based on Council's that increased numbers over the last 7 days as compared to the previous 7, and those that are falling; then calculates for each of the four groups the 7 day moving average.

The Tier 3 downs - (20.8m people) are responsible for the bulk of the fall in the overall 7 day average. Not a great surprise but stll quite stark when you see in the graph falling from a peak of 12,384 down to 5,234.

Given the population disparities I ought to work this out and create a graph based on rates per 100,000.

Obviously not shit a whole year group down although shit does seem to have hit the fan...

GSs school has done mocks early as they are worried about infection rate. He's pleased as won't have to worry about revision over Christmas.

@Witchend

17,272 cases 231 deaths

17k is the highest it's been since Thursday 26th. More found down the back of the sofa, student testing, one off or what?

I wonder if this could be to do with the twice weekly lateral flow tests that has been rolled out.

My Ambulance trust have asked staff to have these fast result tests twice a week and as a result we are very short staffed as the number of people who are having to isolate who were asymptomatic and never have tested under normal circumstances have been found.

Basically if you test positive you have to inform your manager and then get another official covid test, if that is also positive then it will count on the stats. I know a lot of NHS and other areas are taking part in the lateral flow tesing so could be a reason for the increase, or one of them anyway. There are so many positives that the trust is orgnaising counselling and help for staff who find themselves either positive or under stress having to work longer shifts to cover those that are isolating.

My dc are far more aware politically than I was at their age. Brexit really made politics something they were talking about-even my youngest was talking about it with his mates at junior school.

I think students were unfairly blamed at the start of October: Mostly, I suspect the media to deflect it from schools.
However I don't think it's blaming them to think (hope?) the rise might be due to mass testing there-because if they are testing then they presumably will find at least some they wouldn't have otherwise.

as Bill and Oti are through, the same graph but based on cases per 100,000 the "good" Tier 3 group and "bad" Tier 2 group are getting increasingly close.

An article from the BBC about backwards contact tracing and why it works:
www.bbc.com/news/health-54648734

What I don't get is the fact that students are not advocating more for themselves.

At that age, I was going on rallies. But that's difficult at the moment, covid wise.

Apart from that, there has been a huge shift towards students being much more focussed on work and paying off their large loans rather than changing society.

To be fair to younger people they did do all the environmental rallies. Right now I imagine they are fed up and want to left alone to socialise rather than suffer isolation. Really feel for them. Also they are probably more civic minded than people give them credit for.

Does anyone know if lateral flow tests are unclouded?

Included rather

All the students I know are pretty miserable/depressed, stuck in accommodation 24/7 with people they don’t necessarily gel with and trying to keep up with their studies online.
Most are too down to start an uprising.

Exactly. It’s depressing more than anything.

The Lateral Flow Tests are included in pillar 2. The daily reported test numbers are shown on the dashboard , for England at least. coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/testing?areaType=nation&areaName=England

However the most recent 7 day positivity for LFs in England is less than 0.5%.

@herecomesthesun I think the issue with students is that if you don't agree with all the Covid restrictions in your life, you don't really need to organise protests and get political. You can simply ignore them and get on with your life. DD (Y13, but has lots of friends in the year above, ie first year uni) has just shown me a video that her friend sent her of students at Newcastle university all partying, dancing, crowded together. I think a lot of the quieter and more compliant students have probably gone home already, leaving the others to it.

@boys3. They do state that the lateral flow tests are included in pillar 2. But I'm really not sure that they all are. The numbers just look to be 10 fold out from what you'd expect if they were including the uni testing. Plus the unis state that anyone testing positive should go get an NHS lab test - so how do you avoid double counting?

@boys3

as Bill and Oti are through, the same graph but based on cases per 100,000 the "good" Tier 3 group and "bad" Tier 2 group are getting increasingly close.

As I’ve been banging on this I may as well say it again: not reviewing the tiers until 16 December is dangerous in my view. They need to put more areas into tier 3 now, or else cases will continue to grow for another couple of week and will then be way too high going into the Christmas period.

coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/about-data#testing-capacity

confirms that Pillar two includes lateral flow test.

Mass university testing is almost on par with oven ready Brexit deal. Ok I'm exaggerating slightly, but with c. 2 million uni students including post grads not overly so. I think the govt management of expectations rather overlooked the practical realities - for mass student testing as well as Brexit. However as they say the bigger the lie.........

However travel window (wholly unenforceable) limits timeline, and there is simply not anywhere near the capacity given the overall number.

But I would have thought we might have seen higher numbers of tests coming through, the number of LFs reported on the dashboard today fell back to c.27000. Then the whole how are they counted is another question where the answer is somewhat hazy.

[quote Firefliess]@boys3. They do state that the lateral flow tests are included in pillar 2. But I'm really not sure that they all are. The numbers just look to be 10 fold out from what you'd expect if they were including the uni testing. Plus the unis state that anyone testing positive should go get an NHS lab test - so how do you avoid double counting? [/quote]
Thats my thinking too. At our trust you have to geta Lab test too if the quick swab test is positive, and I am not sure the lateral flow test is recorded either. Out of 400 people taking part 32 have tested positive, not sure what that amounts to in terms of percentage but it seems high, although not suprising due to the work they do and the area is rising in case numbers.

I suspect part of the issue with lateral flow numbers is reporting. They are so widely distributed and with no central lab involved, numbers are reliant on all the many places using them reporting that they have done so. I can see a lot being used, for example, in Unis without anyone reporting on a day to day basis that they have actually been used as opposed to just received. I suspect there may be a bulk of reporting done every few days, or even over the week.

@Jenasaurus; your example does raise the question as to when and how, or whisper it if the numbers are feeding through.

Those London positivity rates are pretty dire, I guess it's going to have to move into Tier 3 if there isn't a rapid change. At MSOA level within London it's pretty stark with areas in white and other areas in purple; surely it has to be linked with breaking rules.

[quote boys3]@Jenasaurus; your example does raise the question as to when and how, or whisper it if the numbers are feeding through.[/quote]
We have a fortnightly COVID webinar. I am going to ask this question at the next one and let you know what the response is. It may be different for each area thats using the lateral flow tests but if I can find out the way ours are recorded it may help. I would have thought when they are issued you should have to advise the results but it seems that the lateral tests are almost not beleived until confirmed by a lab test. I suppose if all positive results go on to have a lab test then they will be recorded eventually, if that makes sense.

@ceeveebee the bad Tier 2s are largely made up of London Boroughs and bordering areas (for example in Essex). So we know the reluctance to act there.

I don't wholly agree with you in terms of timelines. However I would share your concern over waiting until 16th Dec to review and then presumably a further delay before anyone moves.

I had initially though that the data would be reviewed two weeks after the initial review (eg two weeks after who was in what Tier was announced) and then changes would take effect from 16th December. To me two weeks additional data from decision point, as opposed to tiers coming into effect point, makes sense. Three weeks, with Christmas then looming, doesn't.

I will ask DS, who took two self-administered lateral flow tests this week, whether he had to report the results! They were both negative which is why he's now home rather than self-isolating at uni. The eastern London boroughs are depressingly high which makes me fear for Tier 3 for London.

They've also given out several months' supply of lateral flow tests to people who work in care homes and the NHS and told them to test themselves twice a week. How are those going to be counted in the statistics? I can't see a reporting mechanism.

I strongly suspect that they've not yet got the systems set up to report the student lateral flow test results. If they were testing 50% of the 2.8m students twice each over a one week period that would be 400,000 tests a day. The figures don't show any additional lateral flow tests above the numbers we were seeing before the uni testing started. So I really don't think the student testing is in there - unless it's been an absolutely mega flop. However if they found 0.5% if those positive, all of which were then confirmed via a lab test, that would add 2,000 positives a day to the reported cases - which we might not easily spot in the daily reported cases.