luchtschip schreef op 16 juli 2021 17:36:
[...]
Dr Gabriel Scally, Public health physician, Visiting Professor of Public Health at University of Bristol, former Regional Director of Public Health in England and a member of @IndependentSage :
How dare UK Government advisors tell the public to be cautious! They've thrown caution to the wind with their policy of deliberately creating a viral surge. It is entirely morally empty and epidemiologically stupid - to quote @DrMikeRyan of @WHO
twitter.com/GabrielScally/status/1416...Covid hospital numbers could get scary - Prof Chris Whitty
he UK is "not out of the woods yet"
and people should act with caution as Covid restrictions in England end on Monday, Prof Chris Whitty has said.
England's chief medical officer warned that Covid hospitalisations were doubling every three weeks and could hit "scary numbers" in future.
Prof Whitty said the pandemic still had a "long way to run in the UK".
Solicitor General Lucy Frazer said while cases will rise, there were "consequences for not opening up".
But she warned: "Of course, if we get into a situation where it is unacceptable and we do need to put back further restrictions, then that of course is something the government will look at."
It comes as:
>>the Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimated 577,700 people in the community had Covid in England in the week ending 10 July - equal to one in 95 people
>>the UK recorded almost 50,000 new cases on Thursday - the highest daily number since January
more than half a million self-isolation alerts were sent to people using the NHS Covid-19 app in England and Wales during the first week of July - a rise of 46% on the previous week
>>Meat processors warned of product shortages due to staff absences, driven by "pings" sent from the app
>>The ONS figures for England represent a rise on the previous week, when one in 160 people were estimated to have the virus.
>>Prof Whitty told an online seminar hosted by the Science Museum on Thursday evening that the situation in the UK could become very dangerous for individual hospitals.
>>He added: "We've still got 2,000 people in hospital and that number is increasing. If we double from 2,000 to 4,000 from 4,000 to 8,000, 8,000 and so on it doesn't take many doubling times until you're in very, very large numbers indeed."
While Prof Whitty cautioned "we are not by any means out of the woods yet", he added that "we are in much better shape due to the vaccine programme, and drugs, and a variety of other things".
"But this has got a long way to run in the UK, and it's got even further to run globally," he said.He said: "I don't think we should underestimate the fact that we could get into trouble again surprisingly fast.
"I think saying the numbers in hospital are low now, that does not mean the numbers will be low in hospital in five, six, seven, eight weeks' time.
"They could actually be really quite serious."
www.bbc.com/news/uk-57858864.