July 8, 2022

expert reaction to latest stats from the ONS Coronavirus (COVID-19) Infection Survey, UK: 8 July 2022

The Office for National Statistics (ONS), have released the latest data from their COVID-19 Infection Survey. 

Prof Mark Woolhouse, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology, University of Edinburgh, said:

“This week’s bulletins from the UK Health Security Agency and the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that COVID-19 cases and hospitalisations continued to increase into early July, driven by the omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5.

“This is now a substantial wave of infection and underlines that COVID-19 is not just a problem in winter.  Last summer, the UK experienced a wave of the delta variant, though thankfully this summer’s omicron variants do not seem to cause as much severe disease as delta.

“In terms of age, the current wave shows the typical pattern of increasing first and fastest in younger adults.  Even though children are still in school they currently have lower levels of infection.  As has happened before, there could still be a delayed wave in this age group, but it is ever more clear that children and schools are not the main drivers of COVID-19 waves.

“Within the health care system highest levels of infection occur in the over 70s.  This group remains most vulnerable to severe disease.  Vaccines continue to provide significant protection but not all elderly people have had their fourth or even their third dose, which increases the risk of severe illness, hospitalisation and death.

“There are hints that the current wave may be beginning to peak: the increase in cases appears to be slowing in the most affected regions, notably Scotland.  Hopefully, next week’s data will confirm this trend.

“There is no reason to expect that waves of COVID-19 associated with new variants will stop any time soon, so we need to plan for a continued strain on the NHS.  We should not think of ‘living with COVID’ as a strategy; it is simply an acceptance of reality.  We are going to need a long-term public health strategy for living with COVID.”

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/8july2022

All our previous output on this subject can be seen at this weblink:

www.sciencemediacentre.org/tag/covid-19

Declared interests

Prof Mark Woolhouse: “Mark Woolhouse is author of a book about the pandemic: The Year The World Went Mad (Sandstone Press).”