Short thread on today's PHE Surveillance Report, covers 3rd-9th May.🧵

Shows very similar case rates to previous weeks, but with some clear divergence for 10-19y/os, and for parts of East mids, NW, and Yorkshire/Humber.

gov.uk/government/sta…
Furthermore, the significant increases in case rates in some parts of the country continues to raise concerns about potential community spread of variants of concern such as VOC-21APR-02 (first identified in India) among the very places already most impacted by the pandemic.
In the most recent week, case rates in Bolton have doubled from 85 per 100,000 to 188 per 100,000, for Blackburn with Darwen they've doubled to 107/100,000.
Along with other parts of NW and Mids, these are the very places that have borne the brunt of the pandemic over the past 15 months - both direct harms from infections and deaths, and indirect impacts of lockdown on jobs and livelihoods.
Without addressing the underlying drivers of inequalities such as insecure work and poor housing that fuel viral spread, it won't be possible to truly tackle the virus and realise a genuinely inclusive socioeconomic recovery.
And finally, partly driving these differences is the disproportionate impact of COVID among minority ethnic groups, which in parts of NW and elsewhere is again becoming apparent.
This is related to deprivation, multiple occupancy & multigen housing, and job insecurity - and also overlaps with differential vaccination uptake.

It yet again highlights the critical role of addressing structural inequalities.

jech.bmj.com/content/early/…

thelancet.com/journals/lance…

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More from @ADMBriggs

13 May
This week's T&T data - covers 29/4-05/05

🧵tl,dr:
- fewer LFDs
- fewer cases
- fewer contacts reached and it's taking longer, plus what might be the role of international cases
- and why this is the last update to our @HealthFdn performance tracker.

gov.uk/government/pub… ImageImage
Firstly on the TT data.

Number of people tested is down this week by 7% to 4.61m, with number of positive cases also down 9% to 14,313. Image
The drop in people tested is again due to changes in the use of rapid LFD tests for people without symptoms, rather than changes to PCR test use.

And nearly 2/3 of the fall is due to less reported secondary school testing. Image
Read 17 tweets
13 May
Latest REACT study shows that case rates between 15th April and 3rd May (round 11) fell by 50% compared with 11th - 30th March (round 10), from 0.20% to 0.10%

Differences by age, region, ethnicity and deprivation remain (with large uncertainty). short 🧵

imperial.ac.uk/medicine/resea…
*Note very wide uncertainty intervals as case rates fall*

In general, highest rates estimated in West Mids and London, and likely falls in all ages except 25-34y/o.

ONS survey tomorrow will update on this.
See the adjusted results showing general trend for higher case rates in bigger households, more deprived and Asian ethnicity - esp with higher viral loads (right hand column).

Again - big uncertainty but consistent with everything else we see with COVID and inequalities.
Read 4 tweets
6 May
Latest T&T data: wk 22-28 April

- no big shifts in numbers tested by LFDs/PCR, and ongoing fall in +ve cases

- but some interesting changes in contact tracing: fewer contacts reached and it's taking longer, and the reasons aren't straightforward🧵

gov.uk/government/pub…
While the number of cases transferred to contact tracing fell by 12% to 10,793, the number of close contacts identified rose by 2% to 49,151.

For the first time since the start of August, avg contacts per case was >5.
And of those contacts, the percentage reached has dropped wk on wk for the past 5 weeks, from 90% to 84%.
Read 15 tweets
6 May
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.
Read 14 tweets
22 Apr
Updated our T&T performance tracker, covers 8-14th April.

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

Detail in 🧵

health.org.uk/news-and-comme…
After a dip over the Easter bank holiday w/e, number of people tested increased by 15% to 4.4m

although this is still some way off the peak of 6.2m four weeks earlier
The changes have been mainly due to variations in use of rapid lateral flow devices (LFDs).

These have been rolled out by the government for people without symptoms over recent months and are now available to everyone in England.
Read 18 tweets
22 Apr
PHE's surveillance report for 12th to 18th April now out. 🧵

Second week of school holidays for most, but some schools will have gone back.

Tl,dr:
- case numbers down & vaccination up
- persistent inequalities by geography, ethnicity, & deprivation

gov.uk/government/sta…
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)
Read 18 tweets

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