Report 41: The 2020 SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in England: key epidemiological drivers and impact of interventions
File(s)
Submitted version
Author(s)
Type
Report
Abstract
England has been severely affected by COVID-19. We fitted a model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission in care homes and the community to regional 2020 surveillance data. Only national lockdown brought the reproduction number below 1 consistently; introduced one week earlier in the first wave it could have reduced mortality by 23,300 deaths on average. The mean infection fatality ratio was initially ~1.3% across all regions except London and halved following clinical care improvements. The infection fatality ratio was two-fold lower throughout in London, even when adjusting for demographics. The infection fatality ratio in care homes was 2.5-times that in the elderly in the community. Population-level infection-induced immunity in England is still far from herd immunity, with regional mean cumulative attack rates ranging between 4.4% and 15.8%.
Date Issued
2020-12-22
Citation
2020
Copyright Statement
© 2020 The Author(s). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
Sponsor
Medical Research Council (MRC)
Identifier
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/mrc-gida/2020-12-22-COVID19-Report-41.pdf
Grant Number
MR/R015600/1
Subjects
Coronavirus
COVID-19
COVID19
Real Time Modelling
United Kingdom
England
Publication Status
In preparation