Tweet

Prof. Christina Pagel

10 Sep, 9 tweets, 5 min read

QUICK THREAD on UK covid situation...

Cases in the UK are going up. We've had high cases for several months now - over 2.7 million confirmed cases since Delta took over in mid May. And no sign of coming down any time soon. 1/9

By nation, Scotland has by far highest rates right now (800/100K people/week). Then come NI & Wales - but NI is decreasing & Wales increasing. Plus Wales has v high positivity rates - that's bad.
England is flattest & lowest right now. Everywhere way higher than year ago. 2/9

Geographically we can see the high numbers in Scotland, NI and Wales. In England cases are highest in the North and parts of Midlands (again), and the SW. English cases flat in adults but rising steeply in under 20s... 3/9

In terms of hospitalisations, NI has very high number of people in hospital but it's flattening (now that cases there are falling). But Scotland and Wales are on steep upwards trajectory.
English hospital occupancy climbing slowly but surely - burden mostly in North again. 4/9

In terms of admissions, levels in England are far lower than Jan peak... but this week we reached 900 a day for first time since February. And we've had high levels for a long time - adding over 5K admissions a week for several weeks now. 5/9

For Scotland, admissions are increasing rapidly again after July dip, following recent v high cases. Now over half of January peak.

Vaccines have weakened the link a lot but it's still there, and cases have consequences. 6/9

Deaths are going up slowly but they are going up. While way lower than January, we are 10x higher than Spring. Since 1 July more than 5,000 people have died.

Right now, about 1,000 people are dying with Covid every week. I don't think we should be OK with this. 7/9

While vaccines are v protective, a lot of the people dying are vulnerable older people.

We should be protecting our frail members of society by lowering community transmission, not just shrugging our shoulders.

We are also causing harm by overburdening NHS. 8/9

And yes, it's perfectly possible to be open and keep Delta down in a highly vaccinated population through sensible additional mitigations (such as masks & ventilation) - many European countries have manged it. 9/9

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

More from @chrischirp

Prof. Christina Pagel

@chrischirp

15 Sep

@BBCNews

THREAD: Was on @BBCNews earlier discussing yesterday's SAGE consensus statement particularly their advice that relatively minor measures could prevent a big autumn surge

assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl… 1/4

Almost a year ago SAGE advised a 2 week circuit break - we don't need that now with vax BUT we do need *something* in addition to the vaccines.
Alongside masks & some continued homeworking, there are clear things we could do that will help that are NOT RESTRICTIVE AT ALL 2/4

The government plan B does not say what "unsustainable pressure" on the NHS is... but the NHS is already extremely stretched and understaffed - and people are exhausted.

25% of current ICU beds are already Covid patients. We need to protect our NHS not keep piling more on. 3/4

Read 4 tweets

Prof. Christina Pagel

@chrischirp

14 Sep

@PHE_uk

THREAD on latest PHE report on vaccine waning (and need for boosters):

Important new report from @PHE_uk on vaccine waning by age and at risk status - basically yes there's waning, but still good protection against severe disease for most people. 1/9

Firstly, protection against symptomatic infection starts waning against Delta (orange) about 10 weeks after 2nd dose (70 days).

Waning with both vax, but AZ starts and ends with lower protection. 2/9

Protection against hospitalisation is much higher and stays stronger - particularly for Pfizer. Some waning in AZ from about 20 weeks (5 months/140 days) after dose 2 but even so efficacy remains at about 80% for AZ after 20 weeks 3/9

Read 10 tweets

Prof. Christina Pagel

@chrischirp

9 Sep

THREAD on Scotland, cases, schools and hospitals:

TLDR: cases *and* hospitalisations in kids are much much higher than they've ever been.

13% of children are off school (for any reason).

England likely to follow suit... Protect schools. 1/7

Schools in Scotland were back by 19 Aug. Scotland moved to its final level of opening on 9 Aug.

Cases in 15-19 year olds shot up week after 9th & carried on increasing after 19th. Most recent week has seen a fall.

Cases 2x previous peak in July and 6x high than Jan peak. 2/7

Of course, many 15-19 year olds are not in school tho.
Looking at Under 15s, we see rise in cases in summer term, drop over holidays and then they have shot up this term. 5x higher than July peak. Last week plateaued... 3/7

Read 11 tweets

Prof. Christina Pagel

@chrischirp

8 Sep

THREAD on what other countries are doing in terms of vaccinating 12-17 children... who's doing it and why?

TLDR: UK one one of the v few high income countries left that isn't 1/20

Almost first off the block in vaccinating 12-17 yr olds were USA and Canada in May.

Canada emphasises the importance of vax to protect kids from acute Covid, prevent long term impacts from covid (eg long covid) and reduce transmission to others.

canada.ca/en/public-heal… 2/20

US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) published a risk benefit analysis, projecting forwards for 120 days using May case rates & estimating how many infections, hospitalisations, deaths were prevented vs new harms from myocarditis. 3/20

Read 21 tweets

Prof. Christina Pagel

@chrischirp

4 Sep

@IndependentSage

THREAD on how to make schools and workplaces safer - inc *three* @IndependentSage reports!

1. late November, cases in school age children were high and rising and we released an urgent plan for safer schools with the Eagle Group for Education.

2. Almost a year later and cases in school age children are much higher than they were then. End of last term, they were higher than ever. Currently rising again and school has just started.

3. Most of the suggestions were never implemented. We believe they are still highly relevant and incredibly important with the rise of Delta and minimal Child vax.

Here are the key principle. The actual document has much more detail!

Read 13 tweets

Prof. Christina Pagel

@chrischirp

3 Sep

@BBCNews

THREAD on Child Vax:
Interviewed on @BBCNews about the JCVI decision not to vaccinate 12-15 year olds.
This was my initial reaction - that it was out of step with most other similar countries. And that they do not seem to have considered long covid at all. 1/6

@BBCNews

@BBCNews I explained that many more kids would now get covid who didn't need to, causing more education disruption, more illness and more transmission. 2/6