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Anthony Costello Profile picture
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5 Apr, 4 tweets, 1 min read
Vaccines alone will not control the pandemic. Isolation of cases and their contacts is critical as cases fall. (1) theguardian.com/global-develop…
Sir Patrick says they got it right a yr ago when they predicted a 2nd + 3rd wave. But he + SAGE on Mar 16 2020 wrote that they were 'unanimous' that China and Asian states wd face a massive second wave. They didn’t. Why? Bec they suppress outbreaks rapidly w trace +isolation. (2)
Two weeks ago Sir Patrick agreed test, trace and isolation would be critical as cases fall. Yet no mention again today of our leaky programme - test results delayed, contacts missed, isolation not monitored, Tories on TV saying £500 'encourages people to be infected'. (3)
The govt think that mass testing is the answer. It might make testing companies rich but it won't control outbreaks. NHS vaccine roll-out is great, but we could lock down future outbreaks with much lower investment in local public health teams than outsourcing.(4)

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More from @globalhlthtwit

Anthony Costello Profile picture
26 Mar
Control of the global pandemic is a balance between achieving population immunity (vaccines, natural infection) and containing/suppressing/eliminating the virus through public health measures (find, test, trace, isolate, behaviour change). Lockdowns are a sign of failure. (1)
Countries that implemented public health measures at speed (S Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Vietnam, China, Thailand, Finland, Iceland, Denmark etc) avoided national lockdowns and their terrible economic effects. And have far, far lower death rates. (2)
Attention to local public health detail is essential...isolate all people with suspected symptoms, rapid test results, one community worker per 1500 population in teams of 5-6, links with primary care teams +data, supported + monitored isolation, reimbursement to all. (3)
Read 10 tweets
Anthony Costello Profile picture
10 Mar
My lengthy thread on test, trace and isolate in light of Sir Patrick Vallance’s comments and the Public Accounts Committee Report committees.parliament.uk/committee/127/… (1)
Yesterday, when asked about his assessment of TTI by Greg Clark, Sir Patrick Vallance said ” Test and trace is working very well at the moment” (March 9 Science Select Committee, 11.32am) (2) parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/36…
Sir Patrick agreed that “The isolate bit is very important (at all levels of cases)..TTI is more important as case numbers fall”. He also identified the importance of backward contact tracing i.e finding which contacts caused the case infection in order to identify clusters.(3)
Read 26 tweets
Anthony Costello Profile picture
10 Mar
Sorry George. Only just seen this. Thanks for the references to hypothesis papers. I don't disagree with Lavine et al’s model when she suggests "SARS-CoV-2 could join the ranks of mild, cold-causing endemic HCoVs in the long run”. Depends upon what is meant by the long run. (1)
Nor that vaccines could slow or accelerate this process depending upon the type of immunity they induce. I certainly agree with her that "These results reinforce the importance of behavioral containment during pandemic vaccine rollout”. (2)
I also agree with Veldhoen and Simas that the "question is whether the vaccines will be effective against reinfection or even eradicate SARS-CoV-2. Here, we suggest both answers are most probably no”. (3)
Read 8 tweets
Anthony Costello Profile picture
7 Feb
There is a lot of nonsense about Zero Covid being an extreme position, only possible in repressive states (er..S Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Norway, Finland, NZ??) and our UK strategy reflects a more sensible centrist view. So compare the UK with successful countries...(1)
In fact we had a clear statement for proper public health control of the epidemic from WHO on Jan 29 2020, and the China Report from WHO on Feb 24 2020. All measures were not controversial and not based on rocket science or modelling. (2)
A new paper from Anhui province (pop 64 million, almost same as UK) in China shows how control was achieved without any severe or prolonged lockdown. sciencedirect.com/science/articl… (3)
Read 12 tweets
Anthony Costello Profile picture
20 Jan
Today we lost 1820 of our citizens. Many of these deaths could have been prevented. I plead with our Secretary of State @MattHancock and @CMO_England to make changes to our community protective shield as follows: (1)
Face the data with humility. Latest data show only 32% of in-person test results were received within 24 hours...Way too slow. For all routes combined, 18.3% of tests from all test sites were received within 24 hours of a test. (2)
Since Test and Trace launched, 97.8% of all contacts managed by local health protection teams have been successfully reached. Performance of call centres is much worse. The % reached within 24h of the case that reported them reaching the contact tracing system fell to 67.7%. (3)
Read 14 tweets
Anthony Costello Profile picture
5 Jan
SAGE Minutes Dec 22: "It is highly unlikely that measures with stringency + adherence in line with the measures in England in November (i.e. with schools open) wd be sufficient to maintain R below 1 in the presence of the new variant. R would be lower with schools closed"
SAGE Minutes Dec 22 "It is not known whether measures with similar stringency and adherence as Spring, with both primary and secondary schools closed, would be sufficient to bring R below 1 in the presence of the new variant." google.com/search?client=…
SAGE Minutes Dec 22 "ACTION: PHE to share information on new variant and South Africa variant with policymakers and ministers for consideration of action".
Read 4 tweets

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