Thread by @Williams_T_C

the #BronchSTART study dashboard beta.microreact.org/project/cTkH24… already contains a huge amount of data
and you can see that there have been unusual regional variations in the RSV season this year 🧵 1/n

https://twitter.com/Damian_Roland/status/1440412304307154949

normally the RSV season starts in the urban centres of the NW of England and London at around the same time thorax.bmj.com/content/75/3/2… and spreads to the rest of the country in the following 3 weeks 2/n

this year, like in previous ones, RSV did start (early? late?) in the urban centres of the NW of England and peaked at epidemiological week 30 3/n

but unlike previous years London lagged behind, so that the peak here was roughly 4 weeks later (week 34) 4/n

meanwhile in Scotland it's not clear whether a peak has been reached or not, with an unusual double peak pattern that it is tempting to ascribe to schools re-starting 5/n

as even more sites come on board, any interested individual or organisation will be able to track RSV spread at high resolution across the UK and Ireland, and find out at a regional level when (if?) case rates start rising again as we move into the autumn/winter 6/n

and find out how our autumn/winter caseload compares to the summer 7/n

with a variety of factors playing into the near future:
- older susceptible population
- influence of schools opening
- climatic variables
- social distancing measures
it is likely that there will be further surprises 8/n

the hard work of the #BronchSTART @PERUKItweep collaborators (and our dashboard from @MyMicroreact) 9/n

means that we can track these changes in almost real time
and begin to understand some of the factors putting unprecedented pressure on our primary and secondary care colleagues END