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Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
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Mar 22 • 4 tweets • 3 min read
Was on @SkyNewsBreak earlier discussing the latest Covid wave - talked about what these regular large waves might mean and that we need to discuss it.

And also emphasised that I have *not* thrown away my (FFP2) masks! 1/4
In the long term we absolutely must invest in cleaner indoor air - like we did with clean water last century.

We *can* do this - but it cannot be done by individuals, but through infrastructure programmes and govt support and incentives. 2/4
At @IndependentSage we have been working on a scheme for businesses to let people know about ventilation in their premisis led by Prof @LizStokoe

Read an update here:
independentsage.org/independent-sa…

3/4
We've also produced a guide for people to help them do what they can to protect themselves from covid by reducing changes of airborne spread with practicalities about masks, windows, HEPA filters... with thanks to @trishgreenhalgh & @adsquires

independentsage.org/independent-sa… 4/4

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More from @chrischirp

Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
Mar 22
SHORT THREAD ON SCHOOLS AND COVID:

Last week I highlighted that cases in kids were rising rapidly again - less than 90 days after the *massive* January surge.

This week Dept for Education released lastest school disruption data... 1/3
We saw that half term following Jan peak decline resulted in thankfully v few kids off in early March.

But this has *massively* increased last few weeks - more than tripled since early March - both primary and secondary. 2/3 Image
We are also seeing rapid increases in the number of teachers off school (for any reason) - back up to levels last seen in Jan with 9% of staff absent.

We must not pretend that these frequent school waves are not causing a LOT of educational disruption. #MakeSchoolsSafer 3/3 Image
Read 4 tweets
Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
Mar 19
THREAD: State of the pandemic in the UK (esp England)

Hospital admissions are best way to compare waves right back to start - we are on wave 7 now! 4 of which happened since last July.

So cases & admissions are rising - why? does it matter? where are we 2 years in?

1/13
Vaccination: Only ~60% of UK pop is boosted, with 20% of pop still unvaccinated (mostly kids).

We're giving very few jabs now - and it matters cos even boosters are now over 10 weeks ago. And for vulnerable jabbed in autumn, over 15 weeks ago...

And boosters are waning. 2/13
This matters as vax fades even faster in more vulnerable older people.

Then, the more transmissible BA.2 Omicron subvariant is dominant everywhere now - just as vax is waning.

AND many more people going back to pre-pandemic behaviours + mandatory self-isolation scrapped
3/13
Read 14 tweets
Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
Mar 15
THREAD: some thoughts on current covid situation in England.

Latest hospital data just came out up to 13 March - almost 1600 admissions - still increasing & 50% higher than 2 weeks ago 1/5
Going up in all regions (fastest in SW & NE) and age groups. Going by prev Omicron (BA.1), about half might be "incidental" admissions - but are clearly showing increase in community transmission.

But boosters are waning - esp older adults who are almost 6 months out. So...2/5
it's possible that more might become "primary" covid admissions but hopefully boosters will hold. We'll see what happens to NHS diagnosis data over the next few weeks. Either way, more Covid in hospitals makes care harder and affects staff absence too. NHS still *exhausted* 3/x
Read 8 tweets
Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
Mar 14
THREAD: @ArisKatzourakis wrote a brilliant @Nature commentary busting some popular - and unfortunately sticky - myths about the evolution of Covid and what this means for the pandemic.

I'll summarise its main points here but TLDR it's not over. 1/7
1. Endemic does NOT mean mild (e.g. TB, Malaria are endemic in some parts of the world). 2/7
2. Viruses do NOT evolve to be less virulent. They evolve to spread more efficiently - sometimes this means they end up more virulent (e.g. higher viral load), sometimes less. 3/7
Read 8 tweets
Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
Mar 10
I wrote about 3 linked lessons from Covid that we need to learn for the future in this editorial for @ScienceMagazine

science.org/doi/10.1126/sc…

1/5
1. Massive, unwieldy, intransigent systems fundamentally changed because of the need to control Covid.

Implies that most sticky problems remain unsolved cos of "won't" *not* "can't" -> we must demand honesty from govts about which solutions are considered necessary & why 2/5
2. Some sticky problems aren't even recognised as solvable! e.g. annual deaths from flu & pneumonia. These reduced massively last 2 years .

Instead of using flu as a benchmark for Covid, question the benchmark.

Instead of return to normal, ask if normal can't be better. 3/5
Read 5 tweets
Prof. Christina Pagel 🇺🇦 Profile picture
Mar 10
THREAD on new evidence showing (again!) that mask mandates in primary and secondary schools do reduce covid rates from the US Center for Disease Control (CDC)

(NB K-12 means kindergarten to yr 12 (17/18 yrs))

full report here: cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/7…

1/4
They compared schools with full, partial & no mask mandates over autumn 2021 in the state of Arkansas and also before & after in schools that switched from no masks to masks.

Using a single state means similar contexts, background infection rates, vaccination rates 2/4
They found clear evidence that full mask mandates were better than partial ones were better than no masks. Whichever way they looked at the data, they found the same effect.

On average full masks reduced transmission by 23% - a significant amount! 3/4 ImageImageImage
Read 5 tweets

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