Delta variant: Expert on vaccines’ impact on transmissibility
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Coronavirus is once again proliferating in the UK, the latest data suggests. According to ZOE COVID Study incidence figures, there are currently 51,961 new daily symptomatic cases of COVID in the UK on average, based on PCR and lateral flow test data from up to five days ago. The ZOE COVID Study UK Infection Survey estimates the number of current COVID-19 positive cases in the community based on the information logged by users in the app and the results from the swab testing programme. Many of these infections are surfacing in the vaccinated population.
“According to data from the ZOE COVID Study, fully vaccinated people now make up nearly 30 percent of positive cases and so it’s critical to be aware of the symptoms of Covid after vaccination,” said Professor Tim Spector, lead scientist on the ZOE COVID Study app.
He continued: “Our data shows post-vaccination infections are much more like a cold than the flu, with the top symptoms being runny nose, headache, sneezing, sore throat and loss of smell.
“We’re again calling on the government to add these cold-like symptoms to their list to help educate the public and catch more cases.”
It’s estimated there are currently 15,309 new daily symptomatic cases in fully vaccinated people in the UK, cases in this group have been rising steadily for the last week and now make up 29.4 percent of the total new daily cases.
New cases are highest in the 18-35 age groups, closely followed by the 0-18 year olds, which suggests that it’s the younger populations who are behind the current rises in cases.
The ZOE data is always a week ahead of the other surveillance surveys and continues to work as an early warning signal, so it is expected that this rise will be reflected in the ONS and REACT-1 figures in the weeks to come.
In terms of prevalence, on average one in 100 people in the UK currently have symptomatic Covid.
The UK R value is estimated to be 1.1 and regional R values are; England, 1.1, Wales, 1.1, Scotland, 1.2 (Table 1) confirming that cases are on the rise in almost all regions of the UK.
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The R number is a way of rating coronavirus or any disease’s ability to spread.
The R number, also known as reproductive value, describes the average number of people an infected individual can expect to pass the coronavirus onto.
According to the latest analysis from ZOE, it’s estimated that 870 cases a day will go on to experience symptoms for longer than 12 weeks, this is the predicted Long Covid incidence rate.
The latest data also indicates that the probability of long Covid now is much lower than the previous wave.
At present the probability of contracting long Covid is much higher in younger people, it shows.
This probability is not related to risk, as research has shown that older people are more at risk of long Covid but it is driven by the fact that more young people are contracting COVID now compared to older generations.
What this means in real terms is that lots of younger people are now suffering from Covid-related symptoms for more than 12 weeks, and this is why vaccination and being sensible is important for this group.
Long Covid characterises symptoms of coronavirus that persist for more than 12 weeks after the initial infection.
There are lots of symptoms you can have after a COVID-19 infection.
Common long COVID symptoms include:
- Extreme tiredness (fatigue)
- Shortness of breath
- Chest pain or tightness.
The ZOE COVID Study incidence figures (new symptomatic cases) are based on reports from around one million weekly contributors and the proportion of newly symptomatic users who have received positive swab tests.
The latest survey figures were based on data from 25,876 recent swab tests done between 7th and 21st August 2021.
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