Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread

[NoGoodPunsLeft]

UK govt pressers Slides & data www.gov.uk/government/collections/slides-and-datasets-to-accompany-coronavirus-press-conferences#history
R estimates UK & English regions www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk
Imperial UK weekly LAs, cases / 100k, table, map, hotspots imperialcollegelondon.github.io/covid19local/#table
School statistics Attendance explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/attendance-in-education-and-early-years-settings-during-the-coronavirus-covid-19-outbreak
Modelling real number of UK infections February to date Link broken?
NHS England Hospital activity www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-hospital-activity/
NHs England Daily deaths www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-daily-deaths/
MSAO Map of English cases Link broken?
Cases Tracker England Local Government lginform.local.gov.uk/reports/view/lga-research/covid-19-case-tracker
ONS MSAO Map English deaths www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-daily-deaths/
CovidMessenger live update by council district in England www.covidmessenger.com/
Scot gov Daily data www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-daily-data-for-scotland/
Scotland TravellingTabby LAs, care homes, hospitals, tests, t&t www.travellingtabby.com/scotland-coronavirus-tracker/
PH Wales LAs, tests, ONS deaths public.tableau.com/profile/public.health.wales.health.protection#!/vizhome/RapidCOVID-19virology-Public/Headlinesummary
NI Dashboard app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiZGYxNjYzNmUtOTlmZS00ODAxLWE1YTEtMjA0NjZhMzlmN2JmIiwidCI6IjljOWEzMGRlLWQ4ZDctNGFhNC05NjAwLTRiZTc2MjVmZjZjNSIsImMiOjh9
ICNRC Intensive Care National Audit & Research reports www.icnarc.org/Our-Audit/Audits/Cmp/Reports
NHS t&t England & UK testing Weekly stats www.gov.uk/government/collections/nhs-test-and-trace-statistics-england-weekly-reports
PHE Surveillance reports & LA Local Watchlist Maps by LSOA www.gov.uk/government/collections/nhs-test-and-trace-statistics-england-weekly-reports
ONS England infection surveillance report each Friday www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/previousReleases
Datasets for ONS surveillance reports www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/datasets/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveydata/2020
ONS Roundup deaths, infections & economic reports www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19roundup/2020-03-26
Zoe Uk data covid.joinzoe.com/data#interactive-map
ECDC rolling 14-day incidence EEA & UK read://https_www.ecdc.europa.eu/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ecdc.europa.eu%2Fen%2Fcases-2019-ncov-eueea
Worldometer UK page www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/
Our World in Data GB test positivity etc, DIY country graphs ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/united-kingdom?country=~GBR
FT DIY graphs compare deaths, cases, raw / million pop ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=gbr&areas=fra&areas=esp&areas=ita&areas=deu&areas=swe&areasRegional=usny&areasRegional=usnj&byDate=1&cumulative=1&logScale=1&per100K=1&values=deaths
Alama Personal COVID risk assessment alama.org.uk/covid-19-medical-risk-assessment/
Local Mobility Reports for countries www.google.com/covid19/mobility/
UK Highstreet Tracker for cities & large towns Footfall, spend index, workers, visitors, economic recovery www.centreforcities.org/data/high-streets-recovery-tracker/

⏭ Our STUDIES Corner ⏮www.mumsnet.com/Talk/coronavirus/3869571-Studies-corner?msgid=99913434

We welcome factual, data driven and analytical contributions
Please try to keep discussion focused on these

Thanks @littleowl1
Really good to be able to see all this so easily. I know my parents have also had comfort in the daily emails so they can see how things are going.

As a light-hearted moment: Did anyone else think that BJ might have actually brushed his hair for the press conference? There were parts of it that looked neat. 🤣

1) People still signed up to ONS / Zoe are more cautious about covid and less likely to be infected; we talked a lot before about responder bias.

This is certainly what seems to be happening where I live. The Zoe has been showing stunningly low figures over the last week, but the govt map has the whole county blue down to district council level for the first time. Even though the Zoe numbers were high before their plummet, they were not that high.

From the twitter of Francois Balloux (@BallouxFrancois), the epidemiologist:

There has been a trend for #COVID19 infections to be somewhat less lethal now than at the beginning of the pandemic. Though, there is no good evidence to date that this is due to #SARSCoV2 having evolved to cause milder disease.
1/

So far we know of only one type of mutations in #SARSCoV2 that may be associated to milder symptoms, (and none associated to worse symptoms). Deletions in the ORF8 gene have been associated with reduced symptom severity in a study from Singapore
2/

Though, such deletions in the ORF8 gene (potentially associated to less severe disease) have been observed since the beginning of the pandemic and have not increased in frequency over time. Interestingly the 'new UK strain' carries a deletion in ORF8.
3/

The Singapore strain with the deleted ORF8 gene ended up eradicated. Most researchers seemed to think it indeed resulted in milder symptoms and less severe outcomes. I guess we will soon see if the same holds true for the UK strain.

@Witchend

“ As a light-hearted moment: Did anyone else think that BJ might have actually brushed his hair for the press conference? There were parts of it that looked neat. “

This made me laugh out loud!!! A very welcome respite in the sea of gloom.

I am wondering if the reason why the UK strain is spreading so fast is the higher proportion of asymptomatic (or, more likely, very mild) cases caused by the ORF8 gene deletion.

It may be wishful thinking (that the virus might have got milder) but it is a plausible hypothesis.

@wintertravel1980

I am wondering if the reason why the UK strain is spreading so fast is the higher proportion of asymptomatic (or, more likely, very mild) cases caused by the ORF8 gene deletion.

It may be wishful thinking (that the virus might have got milder) but it is a plausible hypothesis.

I was hoping that too Winter

@Witchend

Thanks *@littleowl1* Really good to be able to see all this so easily. I know my parents have also had comfort in the daily emails so they can see how things are going.

As a light-hearted moment: Did anyone else think that BJ might have actually brushed his hair for the press conference? There were parts of it that looked neat. 🤣

I hope not wrt Boris' hair as the only other time I have seen his hair neat was the evening before the announcement that he had Covid. It looked like his mum had brushed his hair and wet it down with a damp cloth- I knew straight away that something was very wrong!

@wintertravel1980

I am wondering if the reason why the UK strain is spreading so fast is the higher proportion of asymptomatic (or, more likely, very mild) cases caused by the ORF8 gene deletion.

It may be wishful thinking (that the virus might have got milder) but it is a plausible hypothesis.

It's a nice thought, but as people are generally only testing if they're symptomatic, then would it cause an increase in positive tests?

It's a nice thought, but as people are generally only testing if they're symptomatic, then would it cause an increase in positive tests?

It would eventually - as total infections keep rising, this will also lead to higher positive cases, higher hospitalisations and, sadly, higher deaths. However the IFR rate itself might be going down.

It is probably unlikely that the virus can become significantly milder after a single mutation (we might be talking about 30-40% reduction in severity) but it will be interesting to hear more about the ORF8 gene deletion. I remember reading research about the Singapore stain. Some epidemiologists were expressing regrets that the mildest version of the virus appeared in the country that was so successful at COVID suppression.

Speculation alert! I think lots of people have been getting tests before seeing family at Xmas, so I wouldn't be surprised if we're picking up more asymptomatic spread.

@Chaotic45

Love the BoJo hair observations!!!!

@cathyandclare that’s a very interesting theory. Just thinking that through a bit further, you would expect the “additional” asymptomatic cases to be apparent in the data for the last 7-14 days before Xmas day. And you would expect those asymptomatic cases to go into isolation (which they prob wouldn’t have done otherwise as didn’t realise they had it). So this could actually help reduce the transmission - similar to a mass testing program.

It’s an interesting theory. I must check the number of tests in last few days and see if there has been a notable increase

In the last week, tests are up 4% and cases are up 40%. It's a lovely idea, but the facts don't support it.

@Melroses

1) People still signed up to ONS / Zoe are more cautious about covid and less likely to be infected; we talked a lot before about responder bias.

This is certainly what seems to be happening where I live. The Zoe has been showing stunningly low figures over the last week, but the govt map has the whole county blue down to district council level for the first time. Even though the Zoe numbers were high before their plummet, they were not that high.

Interesting as I've been watching the Zoe app numbers for the last few weeks (very up and down). The neighbouring authority area to us has higher cases by quite a bit, compared to them, yet we were put in tier 3 and now 4. Official figures for local authorities put us a good bit higher than them and rising faster.

I meant Zoe app shows neighbouring authority having higher cases compared to ours. It's been a darker shade of red than us for weeks, now we're all dark red if you click on the big map but numbers wise theirs show as almost double. Actual published figures have them at least 25% lower.

@littleowl The testing numbers are not updated in the site for the last couple of days. No increase visible as yet, but I think we certainly will see a big increase in testing numbers soon.

Is the ZOE app struggling because so many cases are now in school age children and they are much less likely to be logged on the app?

I don’t understand why the increase in cases is not correlating to an increase in hospital admissions, I would have assumed after a lag hospital admissions would show the same spike. But they are not. It’s something like ten percent.

@Bluntness100

I don’t understand why the increase in cases is not correlating to an increase in hospital admissions, I would have assumed after a lag hospital admissions would show the same spike. But they are not. It’s something like ten percent.

What time lag are you allowing for?

The increase in secondary school cases won't cause the same uptick in hospital admissions but it may well cause one later down the line if these young people pass it to others.

Looking at the gov case data. The lag from we started seeing a substantial spike, Ie approx thirty percent is a month now.

And two weeks ago we saw a ten percent. Spike in hospital admissions and it’s now plateaued at that number Ie 1900 a week.

Where as cases are up 30-40 %+ in the preceding weeks.

@Bluntness100 thank you for clarifying, that sounds hopeful? I guess it could still be related to secondary school aged infection, but it is hopeful none the less.

Where I live hospital capacity is apparently a huge issue and my father has had two important operations cancelled for next week so maybe I have a bias based on my personal experience.

The graphs yesterday clearly showed that hospital admissions in the South East at least was on a steep upwards projectory?

The increase in secondary school cases won't cause the same uptick in hospital admissions

Kent Online yesterday reported that children's wards are full of Covid cases and that there has been a concerning increase in hospitalisation of teenagers.