Thread by @jburnmurdoch

NEW: mini-thread of maps & charts to watch for today’s UK tiers:

Here’s where we stand according to latest case data

Lots of blue on the right is good: rates falling almost everywhere. Some exceptions are outer London & south east, where rates are higher and may still be rising

Another way of looking at this is in scatter form, plotting current prevalence (horizontal) vs rate of change (vertical).

Note how inner London areas are in the bottom left: low rates and falling. But several outer London boroughs are above the average and possibly still rising

We can put that last chart into context by comparing it to how things stood on national lockdown eve.

Most areas in "very high" tier 3 had weekly rates above 400 at the time restrictions came in. Today no London borough is at that level, though parts of the south east are.

These comparisons of where things are vs where they were, and against old tier thresholds, are useful, but in recent days the government’s line has been that more places may be put into higher tiers than last time, so e.g the threshold for tier 3 may now be lower (further left).

As we know, this is not going to be a pure numbers game (and for good reason). Two local outbreaks can have very different characteristics despite the same surface-level stats.

It’s absolutely right that public health officials use as much evidence (both quant& qual) as they can

Here’s our story from @JasmineCC_95 @PickardJE @AndyBounds and me on where London and other regions are likely to end up ft.com/content/a48b85…

I’ll be back after the announcement with more charts showing where we’ve ended up