Want some good news?

The UK is doing well on vaccinations - domestically on track to hit its targets and internationally ft.com/content/cdfb7b… via @financialtimes
@FinancialTimes In the most recent week, there were nearly 1.8m first jabs given and it's been speeding up (apart from the weekend)
@FinancialTimes This puts the UK fourth in the world at the end of last week with a vaccination rate twice the best placed other European county, Denmark
@FinancialTimes Why?

Experts say a combination of splashing the cash, approving the Oxford/Astra Zeneca vaccine, the command and control system of the NHS (often bad news, but good in this case)
@FinancialTimes But it's not yet reducing case rates for the oldest groups - in fact these are the only groups where infection rates have increased in the most recent week of data.

Suggesting it will take time for vaccines to work, they're not 100% effective and Covid-19 is back in care homes
@FinancialTimes So, there's still a long way to go before we see the end to infections, hospitalisation and deaths

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More from @ChrisGiles_

19 Jan
UPDATE: Following today's @ONS data for England and Wales, my estimate of the number of UK excess deaths linked to coronavirus since mid March 2020 has surpassed a new grim milestone of

106,300

Of these, 94,745 have been recorded officially, the remainder are estimates

1/ Image
@ONS There is now strong evidence that the number of excess deaths accelerated as the second wave became more intense towards the end of December - estimates of the daily totals rise significantly

But are still well below the spring peak

2/ Image
@ONS It no longer appears true that excess deaths in the second wave are lower than the daily death totals

Why? My hunch is that as waves intensify, hospitals find it harder to save those who would have survived when pressures lighter

3/ Image
Read 8 tweets
12 Jan
UPDATE: A grim set of official figures today on deaths means my estimate of the number of people in the UK who have died since mid March linked to coronavirus is

97,700

After a recent acceleration, UK is on course to hit 100,000 by Saturday

1/
Patterns of bank holidays around the end of the year add to uncertainty, but I have been cautious and there has been a recent
inflection point in excess deaths in the data across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland

Excess deaths rose from mid Dec

2/
Excess deaths had been lower than deaths in hospitals for the whole of the second wave, but in the past two weeks that has no longer been the case.

It suggests fewer people dying of Covid-19 were particularly vulnerable and would have probably died anyway.

3/
Read 6 tweets
11 Jan
There is a remorseless mathematical connection between infections of the over 60s, hospital admisstions, occupied beds, ICU numbers and deaths.

None is looking great - hence the huge concern about the NHS ft.com/content/03e1f5… via @financialtimes
@FinancialTimes Infections of the Over 60s is still rising fast in the latest data. Nothing more than the faintest glimmer of a turning point
@FinancialTimes The same with admissions in England, which have quadrupled since early December
Read 7 tweets
8 Jan
What to make of 1,325 deaths within 28 days of a postive Covid test today

A record on this measure

1) It's bad

2) With 40% not in hospitals, suggests a rising crisis in people's homes and care homes again - that's really bad...

But Image
3) It does need to be put in the context of excess deaths which are running at about 300 a day up to Christmas

4) And since the daily figure was a severe underestimate of the spring peak, this is not a record yet. Excess deaths peaked at about 2,000 a day in April Image
Don't let the more modest excess deaths so far fool anyone into thinking this is mild or like a bad flu year

Since October there have been 19,000 excess deaths in England and Wales. In the last big flu season (2017-18), there were 7,762 in the same period.
Read 6 tweets
6 Jan
Another set of grim Covid data today - daily cases, hospitalisations and deaths up...

That's the big news, but there are a few silver linings in the details of the data

1/ ft.com/content/9f80bc… via @FinancialTimes
@FinancialTimes Some of the worst hit areas for positive cases have stopped getting worse. This is Medway, but the feature applies more generally...

This is Medway, but it applies to v local areas too.

No one should get too excited, the numbers show little sign of decling much

2/ Image
@FinancialTimes There has been somethingof a levelling off in London too in the random testing done by ONS

V early days, but gives hope that the lockdown can work to reduce caseload

3/ Image
Read 6 tweets
6 Jan
UPDATE: following the latest ONS figures, my best estimate of the number of excess UK deaths linked to Covid-19 since mid-March is

89,300

The increase in the second wave has been slower, but longer and more relentless than the first wave

1/ Image
The estimates this week are more speculative than normal because

a) Scotland and Northern Ireland have not published weekly mortality figures since before Christmas

b) England and Wales data had one bank holiday rather than 2 for this week in the year

This means...

2/
If I had used the raw ONS figures, (3,566 excess deaths E&W) it would have produced estimates too high and obviously wrong.

So I had to make adjustments, which I hope were reasonable to keep the trend stable. We will find out next week.

3/
Read 6 tweets

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