Thread by @chrischirp

Quick THREAD on cases & admissions in England & schools...

Cases fell in England for about 2 weeks but started going up again last week.

Some of this increase will reflect more testing again since half term (and positivity rates have fallen a little). 1/9

Reductions were driven by steep drops in school age kids (esp 10-14 yrs), which started week before half term.

Apart from less testing, chains of transmission were broken with continued fall week after half term.

Recent uptick tho, esp 5-9 unvaxxed.

60+ fall, boosters? 2/9

Plausible that 10 days is approx the time it takes for new chains of transmission in school to take hold & drive cases up again. Despite high prev infections.

Leicestershire schools had term & half term week earlier & they are seeing sustained increases in school kids again 3/9

There are also early signs of increase in their parents' generation 30-59 yr olds (same plot below). but not in twenty-something or 60+ : hopefully boosters in latter working but also takes longer to spread from school kids to older generations. 4/9

Leicestershire only saw one big peak in late Sept. The double England peak is probably a sign of moving localised peaks and the Immensa massive spike in SW in Oct.

Scotland too had earlier start to term & earlier half term. So what is happening there? 5/9

Big single peak in Sept (but lower than England max: 1400 vs 1900/100k/wk) but then drop & plateau.

Half term decline, then flat but now under 15 cases rising again along with 15-44 yrs. Falls in 65+

Scotland has masks in 2ndry schools & much higher teen vax than England. 6/9

In terms of admissions in England, they fell but have recently increased a bit over last few days.

However, this seems mainly from 18-64 yr olds - we have seen sustained falled in 65+, hopefully booster induced! 7/9

So I think we are likely to see another peak in school aged children in England this half term - *hopefully* lower than Oct with teen vax & prev immunity. But hard for primary school kids.

Hopefully over 60s boosters will help keep admissions & deaths from rising v much BUT 8/9

I don't think it's ok to mass infect kids (see e.g. this thread from yesterday
)

and also likely their parents will get infected too as their vax immunity wanes and before they are eligible for booster (for many, 6 months is end Dec/early Jan). 9/9

PS see also this thread from @ProfColinDavis yesterday making v similar points.

PPS and also we shouldn't be ok with static admissions ~ 700-800 a day- firstly for the people so sick with Covid and secondly for the NHS which is serious trouble.