Surely we should isolating for the full duration of the incubation period....

[Gohan]

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/health-55274147

So isolating is reduced to 10 days?
But I thought the Covid incubation period was 14 days?
Isn’t this going to create more spread?

I think the majority of spread is done by day 10 and its a very small % infection rate after that. The majority of people aren't complying with the 14 days so maybe more will comply if it's only 10 days

I imagine the vast majority of cases occur within 10 days. What would be the benefit of changing it otherwise?

Only 2% of people are infectious after 10 days - apparently

The average incubation period is a lot less than 14 days: in most people it's 4-6 days. (See figure 2 in link following).

By the time you get to 10 days you have caught 90% of cases. (See figure 3).

bmjopen.bmj.com/content/10/8/e039652

That means that if it reduces the number of people who fail to isolate at all you might actually reduce cases more even though you still miss 10%

E.g if at 14 days 50% of people isolate you stop 50% of cases "escaping" isolation.

But if at 10 days 75% of people isolate (but you miss 10% of their cases) you only have 25% + 7.5% = 32.5% of cases escaping.

Obviously those numbers are made up but it illustrates the point.

Sorry, figure 3 and 4!! Was reading above not below!

Hope none of my family catches it from the 2%.
I’m not sure that more people will comply now, what they should be doing is making sure people are paid properly if they have to miss work or look after isolating children. And then you get the selfish idiots who go on pub crawls when they’re supposed to be isolating.

@Nacreous thank you for the useful info

It makes a huge difference to those with young children. I cannot tell you the weight that has been lifted today knowing my 3 year old & 8 month old & I can leave the house on Wednesday instead of Sunday. I cried with relief. I will still dread any future isolation but it makes it all feel a tiny bit easier now!

I think it’s the right decision. Boris is a knob but I do believe this has been based on scientific knowledge of viruses & increasing understanding of COVID & infectiousness.

The vast majority of people told to isolate as a close contact don’t have covid anyway so the risk of them passing it on will be lower than 2%.

Being sedentary for 14 days - and lots of people have no ability to exercise in their homes, even if inclined too - directly harms your health, if you're young and you return to exercise you'll recover, but many people will not recover the fitness lost in that time period. Isolation causes harm, you need to balance that harm against the benefits.

The persistent idea that lockdown, isolation etc. has no harmful health effects needs to end, it does - it's mostly not as harmful as unlimited covid spread, but it is not free from harm.

Very good point ☝🏻

@sirfredfredgeorge

Being sedentary for 14 days - and lots of people have no ability to exercise in their homes, even if inclined too - directly harms your health, if you're young and you return to exercise you'll recover, but many people will not recover the fitness lost in that time period. Isolation causes harm, you need to balance that harm against the benefits.

The persistent idea that lockdown, isolation etc. has no harmful health effects needs to end, it does - it's mostly not as harmful as unlimited covid spread, but it is not free from harm.

Agree with this. We only had to isolate for 5 days as dh and Ds2 had symptoms then tested negative (good old fashioned stinking cold) but I had jelly legs by the time I left the house Again.

Other countries have reduced it to 10 days as well.
Most of the infections happen on the first few days so 10-14 it’s a big impact on economy - education for the small risk it offers

The chief medical officers have based it on scientific advice so I would suggest know more about the risks than randoms on mumsnet.

I hope it gets reduced to a week as it is in France. Expecting people to stay cooped up for 14 or even 10 days for what could be repeated occasions is ridiculous and apparently lots of people weren’t complying anyway, maybe more will now.

My perception is that the compliance rate is low with a 14 day incubation period, so a lot of people who should self isolate don't do it at all, and they are hoping that by lowering it to 10 days, they will get a higher compliance rate and also reduce all the adverse effects (mental health, financial, learning, etc.) of having to self-isolate by reducing the duration.

The risk of becoming infectious after day 10 does appear to be low enough that if they can get even a small increase in overall compliance for the first 7-10 days, it will reduce the total amount of onward community transmission while also reducing the overall burden.