This week's PHE surveillance report, 26th April - 2nd May
- despite easing of social restrictions & schools returning after Easter hols, case numbers still going down among all ages.
- still regional/local variation
- and ++concerns around variants.🧵 gov.uk/government/sta…
Still some big differences by region - particularly looking at younger adults in Yorkshire and Humber.
Case rates in Y&H are 42/100,000, more than 3 times the rates in the SW at just 12/100,000.
This is even more apparent when looking at data by local authority.
Although some positive news as some of the differences by ethnicity and deprivation may be beginning to narrow.
In terms of incidents/outbreaks reported to PHE.
Still as low as ever for care homes and hospitals.
And a small increase in edu settings, as would be expected.
The next ONS surveillance data update will provide a little more clarity on if this is translating into meaningful increases in cases among children/young adults.
No surprises in the morbidity and mortality data, remaining as comforting as it has been in a while.
And while overall vaccine uptake remains impressive...
It masks some major differences by ethnicity, with nearly twice the percentage of people aged over 50 who are White having had two doses of the vaccine compared with those who are Black.
So much work still to be done here.
In general it all looks pretty rosy for the gov road map review in advance of 17th May.
EXCEPT for the rapidly growing concerns about variants, particularly B.1.617 (first detected in India)
While things look good for the first three, the fourth is less clear. Tomorrow's update of variant data looks increasingly important.
In particular, it makes the idea of opening things further for international travel seem particularly risky.
Plus it reinforces the basics of ensuring that everyone can get tested, and has the necessary support and means to isolate.
This includes tackling ongoing structural issues like insecure work/multiple occupancy HHs. + giving local gov & health protection teams the resource, flexibility, & support they need to manage.
It'll help places with ongoing high cases AND slow local spread of variants.
Key points
- lots of changes to LFD use, with differences across the country
- despite falling cases, end-to-end journey time from symptoms to reaching contacts increasing
Case rates & positivity continue to fall across the age groups with no clear sign of pre-Easter rise in school-age cases leading to more infection in older ages.
Highest in 10-19y/o (42 per 100,000) and lowest among 70-79y/o at just 7.2/100,000.
A pattern matched by ONS survey
Case rates also falling across all the regions, with slightly higher rates in Yorkshire and Humber (45 cases per 100,000 compared with just 14/100,000 in the SW).
Again not dissimilar to ONS and good to see case rates come down (next ONS update due tomorrow)
Further drop in cases in the most recent week following a bit of a flattening off in previous weeks - with some of this due to school holidays and fewer LFD tests.
Worth noting that for March, both REACT and ONS surveys suggest that case rates are generally static.
Big drop in LFD use, which is mainly due to a drop in test use by secondary schools (see T&T data).
The drop off has accelerated with the school holidays, but the move from testing in school to at home may have contributed over the past few weeks.