Has Kent, Essex and London Plateaued?

[littleowl1]

I have been tracking the cases in Kent, Essex and London over recent weeks and I think the tide might be turning.

I am so relieved as, for a while there, it seemed like even draconian social restrictions were having little effect.

But now, cases in Kent and Essex have been registering falls week-over-week and, gosh I don't want to jinx it, but I think London may have plateaued too.

Wouldn't that be good news!

I have attached the charts and the link to the full analysis here:
www.covidmessenger.com/latest-analysis/

And you can also see this by clicking the "County" header on the table on www.covidmessenger.com.

See all the "green" councils in Kent and Essex!!

Two weeks ago there was only 1 council in the country that was "green" (ie registering falling cases) - the "whole" table was "red".

Might this lockdown will be short and sharp?

I thought the doctors being interviewed were only now beginning to see the effects of the mixing at Christmas?

I think cases have plateaued in some places due to lockdown, but there will still be loads of deaths - they are locked in from before Christmas, right? Takes ages for case totals to come down too.

Think you’re right @littleowl1 looking at my area, steady if slow decline. Thanks for the good news.

It does seem to be slowing a little- 665 less cases in my area than last week and numbers per 100,000 are below 1000 for the first time in quite a few weeks.

I hope so! Essex resident here, and it's felt rather dicey of late, to say the least! Thanks for the data.

@StepOutOfLine There should have been very little mixing in Kent, Essex and London at Christmas as most of it was in tier 4.

I’m in Essex and had noticed the decline in cases over the past few days. Fingers crossed that we are over the worst.

Yes, in east London we are down but not by much. Hopefully the tide is turning!

Zoe app has been showing a decline in case rate for several days. R in SE and E of E showing as 1 and in London as 0.9

And Herts too

I hope so but it is still far too high. Now in total over 10,000 have died in London.

Kent resident here, I think we are, being very quietly hopeful.

I think most people here are abiding by Tier 4 then into lockdown - local roads are quiet, supermarkets are quiet, my local park is quiet.

There are swathes of areas in Kent that are continuing to rise day on day.
I would be reluctant to try and make any sort of sweeping statement as yet, especially as much of the bordering counties are also not decreasing.

It looks like it. I did a check for covid test availability in north London and there’s loads at any time you want. A good indicator of much less demand. There’s also very few people on the streets these days. Fingers crossed that it translates into lower numbers in hospital soon.

I'm in one of the original Tier 4 areas that wasn't London, Kent or Essex and we've definitely seen cases plateau and now start to come down during the last week. That's after effective lockdown since 20th December i.e. 3.5 weeks. Other areas that started rising later are now overtaking in terms of cases, but I think it's encouraging that lockdown does seem to be having an effect. Obviously the cases and hospital admissions are still too high, but at least a step in the right direction.

In London, yes. Cases, hospitalisations, ZOE and anecdote all saying the same thing. With the lag I think true infections peaked around Christmas Day and they've been dropping off since. I'm not sure why.

I haven't looked at the data, but I'd be interested to see how it compares in areas where people were allowed to mix over Christmas.
It's horrendous at the moment in London but I'm quietly hopeful it we'll soon hit the crest of the wave and it will get better from there...

Yes definitely looking better. Between that and the fantastic work going into the vaccination program things as looking up.

All my local over 80s will be vaccinated by Friday at 8pm apparently

Hopefully we can avoid restrictions getting tighter by the rest of the country seeing similar soon.

Bristol cases still rising but seem to have slowed a bit. We were in tier 3 and then had a week of tier 2 over Christmas plus the mixing. Hopefully our cases will start to come down soon too.

Ours near Liverpool seem to be on the way up, sadly. Numbers at or around the 1000/100,000 which is doubly depressing, given how low we dropped after we were the first into tier three back in October

@StepOutOfLine

I thought the doctors being interviewed were only now beginning to see the effects of the mixing at Christmas?

Christmas was around 3- almost 4- weeks ago. The deaths and hospitalisations now are likely from Christmas/NY mixing, or from mixing just before those areas went into Tier 4. Case rates do seem to be dropping off in some areas (thank goodness), and I have everything crossed that it will translate into a falling hospitalisation/death rate very soon.

Even if its only in some areas, if, for eg, Essex and Kent can free up some critical care beds they can take patients from other areas if needed.