Number of Brits falling ill with Covid stays FLAT with 2,750 cases a day despite Indian variant

Britain’s Covid outbreak is staying flat at 2,750 cases a day despite the spread of the Indian variant, according to a symptom-tracking app, as Boris Johnson tells MPs he is ‘even more optimistic’ the June 21 lockdown easings can go ahead.

ZOE and King’s College London’s experts estimated the equivalent of one in 1,796 Brits had symptomatic Covid in the week to May 15. This was not a significant change from the previous week. 

Professor Tim Spector, the epidemiologist who leads the app, said the mutant strain ‘hasn’t altered the numbers significantly’ and that outbreaks remain focused in local areas. 

‘We noticed the same trend previously with outbreaks of the South African and Brazilian variants, but these remained local and didn’t translate into wider cases countrywide,’ he added. ‘I expect to see rates stay at similar levels for a while.’

Whitehall insiders say the ‘mood music has definitely improved’ after new evidence suggested the mutant strain may now be just 30 per cent more contagious than the current dominant Kent variant. 

Professor Jonathan Van-Tam told a Downing Street press conference last night that the strain may be between a few per cent and 50 per cent more infectious, with his best guess ‘somewhere in the middle’. Even the notoriously gloomy SAGE adviser Professor Neil Ferguson said there was a ‘glimmer of hope’ it was not as transmissible as first feared.

The Prime Minister revealed to the powerful 1922 committee of Tory MPs last night ‘we can see nothing to suggest that we have to deviate from the road map’. He added he was ‘increasingly optimistic’ that the current crop of vaccines could still beat the strain. 

One senior official told Sky News that the updated estimate would allow the June 21 unlocking to go ahead, despite fears the rapid spread of the B.1.617.2 variant had derailed the plans. Matt Hancock said last night no decision on relaxing the final set of restrictions will be made until next month.

But the plans could still be diluted — with the end of social distancing, mask wearing and working from home guidance pushed back to a later date.  

SAGE models warn Covid hospitalisations could spiral to more than 20,000 a day if the June easings went ahead and the strain was found to be 50 per cent more transmissible. Government advisers also warned a variant that is 30 per cent more transmissible than the Kent variant could pile more pressure on the NHS than the first wave last spring.

The Indian variant — which now makes up one in five of all cases spotted in England — has already spread to at least 48 countries, figures show, and is now on every continent except Antarctica.

Matt Hancock revealed to MPs yesterday are now almost 3,000 cases of the Indian variant in the UK, with the figure having quadrupled in a fortnight. Surge testing has been deployed in Bedford, Burnley, Hounslow, Kirklees, Leicester and North Tynside to root out cases of the strain.

It comes as ministers accelerate the roll-out with plans to reach everybody over-18 within a month. Over-30s could be offered at least one dose by the end of May, with those in their early 20s jabbed in the first two weeks of June. England’s roll-out was expanded to 34 and 35-year-olds today.

Britain recorded 2,696 infections yesterday, up 18 per cent on the number a week ago, and three deaths. Professor Van-Tam said the death rate was now at an ‘extremely low place’. More than 36.9million Britons – or seven in ten adults – have had at least one dose of the jab. 

Scientists say the variant may not be as transmissible as first feared as official data is beginning to show a slowdown in rising cases of the mutant strain.

They say the spike could be down to the virus spreading in multi-generational households, and people rushing home from India after the country was placed on the ‘red list’. 

Professor Carl Heneghan, the director of the Centre for Evidence-based Medicine at Oxford University, told the Telegraph: ‘How can it be the case that it is 40 per cent more transmissible when the numbers are falling off at the speed they are in India?

‘We could be looking at a founder effect (when a strain is repeatedly imported from another outbreak area) and where you’ve got a small number of people having a bigger impact.

‘India is actually looking more like the natural curve which happens in winter and has a high drop-off as opposed to flattening the curve.’

India’s cases have dropped by 27 per cent in a week. They recorded 267,334 on Tuesday, down from 348,421 cases at the same time last week. 

England’s deputy chief medical officer Professor Van-Tam said last night: ‘We have a credible range that goes from a few percent more transmissible through to… 50 per cent more transmissible. I think most people feel it is going to be somewhere in the middle, rather than at the extremes of that band.’ 

Top scientists handed information to ministers last night which put the situation ‘looking in better shape’, a senior Government official told Politico, although they were ‘obviously still waiting for more data’.

A health official added: ‘We are learning more about the variant almost every hour and the mood music has definitely improved’.

The Prime Minister told MPs in the Commons yesterday that the jabs were also still fighting off the mutant strain, saying he had ‘increasing confidence that vaccines are effective against all variants, including the Indian variant’.

One senior minister told Sky News that Mr Johnson would ‘move heaven and earth’ in order to stick to the June 21 unlocking moment.

Another added it would be politically ‘very bad’ to miss the deadline. ‘We told people in December the vaccine would be our way out of this and this would be our final heave,’ they said. ‘To go back on that would be very difficult.’

While cases of the new strain have quadrupled in the last fortnight in Britain, hospitalisations of people with Covid have remained ‘fairly flat’ compared to previous spikes. Covid deaths are now averaging around eight a day.

Top experts say this is a key signal that the vaccines are working. Clinical studies showed they were 100 per cent effective at preventing hospitalisations and deaths with the virus.

Official data shows cases of the strain are also concentrated in younger age groups, which are yet to be offered at least one dose of the Covid vaccine.

In hotspot for the Indian strain Bolton, the vast majority of patients in hospital suffering from the virus did not get their Covid vaccines despite being eligible.

The Health Secretary urged Britons to keep coming forward for their jabs yesterday, saying it was the best way to get out of the pandemic. 

He said: ‘This is on all of us, we are masters of our own fate. We are seeing the vast majority of cases, both of the existing variant and of the B.1.617.2 variant, amongst younger groups and unvaccinated people.

He added: ‘On the one hand hand that is actually a good sign as it implies the vaccine is working effectively, but obviously we don’t want to see a huge increase in the number of cases everywhere.’ 

Vaccines are turning the tide against this pandemic and I’m incredibly proud the UK has one of the highest uptake rates in the world, with 90 per cent of people saying that they have had or will have the jab.

‘Strong evidence shows the vaccines protect you and your loved ones from serious illness, and they also reduce transmission, which is why we’ve introduced additional surge measures in the areas with rising cases of the variant first identified in India,’ Mr Hancock said.

He added: ‘Thank you to everybody who has come forward so far – we can beat this virus together if we all play our part and get the jab as soon as we’re eligible.’

Professor Ferguson said yesterday the spike in cases in the North West may be down to infections spreading rapidly in large, multi-generational households in densely populated areas.

‘There’s a glimmer of hope from the recent data that while the virus does appear to have a significant growth advantage, the magnitude of that advantage seems to have dropped a lot.’ 

His comments were echoed by deputy chief medical officer Professor Jonathan Van-Tam, who described Britain’s situation as a ‘straight race’ between the vaccination programme and the new strain. 

He added: ‘The NHS is doing everything it can to turbo-boost that, and that is the challenge that’s ahead of us in the next two to three to four weeks, to make sure that we outrun the virus through really vigorous pull-through on vaccine delivery.’ 

Trials of Covid booster shots were also announced at last night’s press briefing, as ministers gear up to offer third doses to all over-50s this autumn. 

Southampton University scientists will recruit thousands of fully-vaccinated Britons to the study, which will test seven Covid vaccines as part of the world’s first clinical trial into booster shots. 

Mr Hancock said he was ‘delighted’ and that the tests will ‘shape the plans for our booster programme later this year’, adding: ‘We will do everything we can to future-proof this country from pandemics.’ 

Professor Van-Tam advised people in Covid hotspots to ‘think carefully’ about using the new freedoms they have this week. 

When asked if he would advise people in areas such as Bolton with high coronavirus rates against taking advantage of new freedoms, he said: ‘I would advise the residents in those areas to think very carefully about the freedoms they have, weigh up the risks and be very cautious. 

‘It is possible to do something outside, better to do it outside. If it is possible to do something with smaller numbers, with people you know rather than multiple new contacts, it’s better to do that. Take it steady.

‘The Government has given people freedoms to start to make these judgements for themselves and I understand that we can’t live for years and years on end with rules, people will have to learn to manage these risks from Covid for themselves because this is not going to go away in the short term, medium term and probably the long term.’ 

Mr Hancock told the press conference: ‘Overall hospitalisations and deaths remain very low, meaning we have been able to carefully take away more restrictions this week as we’ve taken step three of the road map.

‘But we must proceed with vigilance and with everyone taking personal responsibility.

‘We’ve always known that one of the things that has the potential to knock us off track would be a new variant.

‘That’s why we made the presence of a new variant that could do that one of our four tests when we set out the road map, which is the tests we must pass for going down each step of the road map.

‘The early evidence suggests that the B1617.2 new variant, first discovered in India, passes on more easily from person to person than the B11.7 variant that was first discovered in Kent.

‘But as the Prime Minister said at lunch time, we have increasing confidence that the vaccines are effective against it.

‘That means that our strategy is the right one – to carefully replace restrictions on freedom with the protection from the vaccine.’

Mr Hancock revealed that the case rate in Indian variant hotspot Bolton was 283 per 100,000, after doubling in a week. He said 25 people were currently in Bolton’s hospitals with the strain, of which the ‘majority’ were unvaccinated. 

Among those that had been jabbed, 90 per cent had not been given both. Mr Hancock said: ‘This shows the importance of getting vaccinated – not once, but twice.’  

The latest figures came as the Government under fresh criticism for taking too long to ban travel from India, as Labour today claimed the border had been ‘like a sieve’ throughout the pandemic.  

Despite the threat of the Indian variant to the UK only being made public last week, reports today suggest the Government was warned about the danger it posed to the UK four weeks ago.

At that time, the strain was already decimating hospitals in India’s major cities and yet thousands of travellers were still flying into Britain from the country every week.

Ministers met for crisis talks two weeks later to thrash out plans to deal with the strain, with some advisors warning against going ahead with stage three of the roadmap, Sky News reports. 

The Indian variant has already spread to at least four in 10 areas of England and accounts for one in five new infections since being imported to the UK in late March.   

Mr Johnson tried to strike a positive tone at PMQs yesterday, saying he had looked at the data again this morning and there was ‘increasing confidence’ that vaccines work against ‘all variants, including the Indian variant’. 

Asked by Labour leader Keir Starmer whether mutant strains was the biggest risk for the loosening, Mr Johnson said: ‘I certainly think that is one of the issues that we must face.’

He added: ‘We’ve looked at the data again this morning and I can tell the House we have increasing confidence that vaccines are effective against all variants, including the Indian variant.’  

Asked about what data the PM has seen to make his ‘increasing confidence’ comment, a No10 spokesperson said: ‘We have regular data that is published daily that tracks through right down to a very granular level on things like case rates.

‘That is the information that the Prime Minister is seeing. 

‘Currently in that data we are not seeing any sharp increases or significant areas of concern.

‘Clearly it is important to stress that we want to give more time to get more data in so we can make decisions on our approach on the next step.’ 

They added data includes hospitalisation rates, case rates, positivity rates ‘and a number of studies published here and around the world which continue to show high levels of efficacy against variants’.

Pressed during an interview on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme for his ‘hunch’ about whether the next stage of the roadmap would go ahead on schedule, Prof Ferguson said: ‘I think that is being actively considered. 

‘It is very much in the balance. The data collected in the next two-three weeks will determine that.’  

He said it was not yet clear how much more transmissible the Indian variant is, but added: ‘Certainly, it is much easier to deal with 20 per cent, even 30 per cent (more transmissibility) than it would be 50 per cent or more.’

During a round of interviews this morning, Professor Ferguson said data had suggested the current jabs were less effective at stopping people from catching the mutant virus.

He claimed the Government’s scientists were ‘slightly concerned’ this could give the surging strain more opportunity to spread to vulnerable and unvaccinated groups.

But Professor Ferguson insisted there was a ‘good deal of confidence’ among SAGE that the vaccines will protect against severe disease and death, which would be crucial in protecting the NHS in the event of a third wave.

Asked about the Indian variant’s effect on vaccines, Professor Ferguson told the BBC Radio 4 Today Programme: ‘It is something which is being studied very carefully. 

‘There’s a good deal of confidence, and the data is being gathered, that the vaccines will protect against severe disease. 

‘The effect of the Indian variant on the vaccines will be fairly marginal in terms of the protection against severe disease, so the vaccines protect individuals. 

‘The thing we’re slightly concerned about is whether there’s an impact on the ability of vaccines to prevent infection or mild disease and, therefore, prevent transmission in the community. 

‘There are some hints, and it’s not vaccine-specific at the moment, in the data of reduced vaccine efficacy against infection and transmission, but we really have to wait as more data is gathered to be definitive about that. 

‘But of course it’s a concern because, if we don’t have the same action of vaccine at blocking transmission, it’s another way for the virus to amplify itself in the community.’  

Even though the vaccines seem likely to prevent severe illness, there are fears that the new variant could spill into the 30million Britons who have still to get their jab.

There are also a very small number of people for whom the vaccines will not work, because the person is very frail or has a weakened immune system. 

Professor Ferguson revealed that, since SAGE’s warning about the Indian variant last week, there was new data which suggested the strain could be less infectious than first feared.

He said the data was still uncertain because scientists are trying to disentangle whether the virus is extremely transmissible or whether there are behavioral and social factors at play.

Professor Ferguson added: ‘To explain to people why this is difficult [to work out exactly how infectious it is]… It’s because of how it was introduced into the country, it was introduced from overseas, principally into people with Indian ethnicity – who are at a higher chance of living in multi-generational households and often in quite deprived areas in high density housing.

‘So we’re trying to work out whether the rapid growth we’ve seen in Bolton is going to be typical of what we can expect elsewhere.

‘There’s a little bit of what I would say is a glimmer of hope, from the recent data, that while this virus does still appear to have a significant growth advantage, the magnitude of that advantage seems to have dropped a little bit with the most recent data, so the curves are flattening a little.

‘But it will take more time for us to be definitive about that.’

He said even if the strain was found to be 20 per cent more infectious than the Kent one, this would be ‘much easier to deal with’ than if the figure was 50 per cent. 

Ministers think clearer data on the Indian variant will come in next week, in the form of hospital pressures. It can take up to a week for infected people to fall ill enough to need to be admitted to the NHS for treatment. 

Given that the virus has only began to spread rapidly over the past fortnight, hospital figures remain low.

Experts hope the vaccines have broken the link between cases and hospitalisations or death but can’t be sure until they see real-world statistics from hotspots such as Bolton and Blackburn.

Whitehall insiders told The Times that sewage is also being monitored to find other flare-ups of the variant across the country.

If the spread of the variant does translate into increased pressure on the NHS, then England’s June 21 ‘freedom day’ plans could be disrupted.

Professor Ferguson said it could be two or three weeks before data provided firm conclusions about the variant and what impact it will have on the lockdown easing roadmap.

And fellow Government adviser Dr Mike Tildesley, from the University of Warwick, said ‘we’ll get much more evidence’ over the next fortnight.

This is despite Boris Johnson suggesting yesterday that the picture would become clearer in ‘days’.

It comes as Labour’s shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth today called for the Government to publish its internal review of its handling of the Covid crisis.

He said it would help the UK ‘prepare’ for the next stage of the pandemic and ensure better scrutiny of No10’s response to the Indian variant.

Labour will table a motion today to require the Government to publish the internal review. Mr Ashworth told Times Radio: ‘We need to learn lessons and prepare for the next stage.

A separate report by the National Audit Office (NAO) found that the pandemic had ‘laid bare existing fault lines within society and has exacerbated inequalities’.

Epidemiologist Dr Tildesley suggested that people should ‘ration’ hugs while there is still uncertainty around the variant first identified in India.

The member of the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling (Spi-M), which advises the Government, told BBC Breakfast: ‘We’ve had a relaxation of restrictions on Monday, which is really great news for people’s mental health and wellbeing and for businesses and so forth because we’ve had really tough restrictions for a long period of time.

‘But we still need to remember that there are some measures in place.

‘We’ve been able to relax controls but we still need to be a little bit cautious.

‘For example with hugging, again great for people’s wellbeing, but I suspect what we really need to do is maybe ration that a little — I’m not going to stop my children from hugging their grandparents for example — but I think we need to be a little bit careful.’

He added that people should not think that the epidemic is over, adding: ‘Hopefully we can get back to normality sooner rather than later.

‘But we need to ease into that so we need to be a little bit cautious over the coming weeks just to make sure that we don’t get a resurgence of cases.’

Health Secretary Matt Hancock was warned there could be ‘unrest’ in Bolton if the Government brings in local lockdowns to contain the Indian variant.

David Greenhalgh, Conservative leader at Bolton Council, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘We’ve been there before and they don’t work – not in a dense conurbation like Greater Manchester.

‘This happened before, the spread increased because people travelled 50 yards across the county boundary to access hospitality that they can’t in their own area.’

Asked if he had told Mr Hancock there would be civil unrest, he said: ‘I do think there is a danger of unrest.

‘There is a great deal of resentment. Bolton was… we were disproportionately affected really since July last year.

‘Even when our rates were coming down, we still remained in lockdown when other areas’ rates were higher than ours, so there was a build up of resentment.

‘The people of Bolton have a great spirit and they come together when times are difficult.

‘But this would be a very, very difficult situation to manage I believe – if we went into a lockdown that we have personal experience of as a town, which did not work.’

Mr Greenhalgh said there was no sign yet that cases were coming under control in Bolton, adding that ‘our cases are still rising’.

He continued: ‘I think that was, to be honest, expected. We are putting all the measures in that we can at the moment.

‘We have community spread, there’s no doubt about that, and we’re holding back a variant that would appear – although the evidence is still being gathered – to be a little bit more transmissible, easily transmissible.

‘The majority of our cases are in very much our younger age groups – primary school, secondary school and in their 20s.

‘We still haven’t got an increase in hospitalisation and severe illness, which is hugely welcome, those figures still remain low.

‘We’re doing everything we can. The Government has sent in surge vaccinations, surge testing… We’re doing everything we can, but I think the next two weeks we will still see our cases rising.’

Figures for the seven days to May 14 show that Bolton continues to have the highest rate of new Covid cases per 100,000 people in England.

It had 867 new cases in the seven days – the equivalent of 301.5 cases per 100,000 people. This is up from 150.2 in the seven days to May 7.