Thanasis Gavos London
The peak of the newest wave of the coronavirus pandemic in England may have already passed, according to the analysis of the latest statistics.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) reports in its latest weekly study, based on tens of thousands of sampling tests, that one in 50 people in England was infected with the virus during the week to 30 October.
This is a proportion of 1.1 million citizens. It is the third highest weekly count since the beginning of the pandemic.
However, it is almost the same as last week, which puts an end to the continuous weekly increases in the proportion of players over the last quarter.
Many scientists estimate that this indicates that the continuous increase in cases that occurred due to the return of students to school in September may have now reached their natural peak and will now give way to a gradual decrease in cases. As they say, this would be the expected result of the immunity that has been created among the students due to the many infections but also the start of vaccination at the ages of 12 and over.
Indeed, the latest data from the ONS show a reduction in cases under the age of 16 and stable rates of infection in other age groups.
At the same time, the government’s advisory scientific committee SAGE announced that the R value of the virus reproduction rate in the UK fell to 0.9-1.1 from 1.1-1.3 last week.
According to the ONS, the proportion of institutions per capita decreased in Wales and Scotland, but increased slightly in Northern Ireland during the week to 30 October.
Cambridge epidemiologist Dr Ragib Ali said the results were “more than expected” and reinforced the argument of those who believe the new wave of the pandemic in England peaked in the second half of October.
Professor Jim Naismith of Oxford agreed, with particular emphasis on encouraging a reduction in cases among minors.
And Professor Paul Hunter from the University of East Anglia estimated that the ONS study is consistent with other evidence of a declining incidence of cases.
Instead, the molecular microbiologist at the University of Reading, Dr. Simon Clark, cautioned that it could be a temporary reduction in the spread of the virus due to the autumn school holidays of the last week of October.
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