Thread by @Kit_Yates_Maths

A short thread on cases and positivity in the UK

Cases have been coming down in the UK since early January, but last week we bottomed out and this week we have seen small week on week increases (green) in cases, leading to a rise in the 7-day average (black).

1/10

Looking at the 4 nations of the UK, cases have fallen since last week in Northern Ireland, England (slightly) and Wales (marginally), but risen in Scotland.
Wales is down to last September levels, but other nations have a little way to go.

2/10

When we see a rise in cases it makes sense to check positivity (cases detected/tests).
Just looking at PCR test positivity, it seems to be flat across all nations.
Other good news is that positivity rates are low (well below 2% for all nations).

3/10

At a regional level in England cases (per 100K per week) are low and are flat in most regions but have increased slightly in East Midlands, North West, and North East.

4/10

Again, its good to check these raw numbers with PCR positivity rates.
Regional rates are all below 2%.
Six regions saw reductions although there were very small rises in the North West, North East and East Midlands.

5/10

Drilling even deeper,123 (39%) of English local authorities (LAs) this week (orange dots) had an increase in cases compared to the prior week (grey dots) and 213 (68%) LAs had rates higher than Sep 1 (green).

6/10

Its a similar picture with positivity in English LAs. 117 LAs (37%) saw rate increases week on week, albeit almost all were very small.
Only 68 LAs (23%) still had higher rates than Sep 1 (green).

7/10

Bolton, Blackburn with Darwen (North West) and Erewash (East Midlands) saw the largest increases in cases.
The first two have also seen well-publicised increases in cases of the variant of concern (first sequenced in India) B.1.617.2.
8/10

All Scottish LAs were below 4%, with 10 out of 32 LAs showing small increases.
All Welsh LAs were well below 4%, with 8 out of 22 showing small increases.
All NI LAs were below 5%, with 3 out of 11 showing very small increases.

9/10

Overall, just looking at testing data, it is a fairly positive picture.
Looks like we are passing roadmap Test 3: "Infection rates do not risk a surge in hospitalisations which would put unsustainable pressure on the NHS.",
but that we are near the bottom of infection.
\ENDS

With thanks, as ever to Bob Hawkins for his help preparing the data.