THREAD NE: The ONS Infection survey today confirmed the really concerning situation in the North East - 2.6% pop estimated with Covid, much higher than elsewhere.
Cases there are now 28x higher than there were 1 June. 1/6
Why? Contact rates haven't been higher than anywhere else and home working is on a par with all regions apart from London 2/6
It's not people going out more or going to work differently. 3/6
The North East does have more deprivation - which is a risk factor for exposure to Covid but not so much more to explain the higher infection rates.
It *does* have a very vulnerable population though 4/6
And the NE is as vaccinated as rest of England - if anything a bit *more* vaccinated. 5/6
It had a "milder" 2nd wave than some regions but not less than Yorkshire or SW or E Midlands.
So hard to understand what it is. Could be a v unlucky combo of circumstances.
I still worry about a new mutation of Delta that has not been picked up yet (it's very hard to do). /END
PS thanks to Bob Hawkins for these charts and data collection!!
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