In this most recent YouTube update, Professor Tim Spector from the Zoe Covid Symptom Study gives a very downbeat assessment of the current status of the pandemic and anti-Covid measures in England. The title he has assigned to this episode - "Freedom fails as COVID cases surge amidst new variant" - presumably reflects what he thinks, but doesn't say overtly, about the effect of declaring "Freedom Day" and the subsequent "complacency" leading to abandonment of masking and social distancing by a significant proportion of the population.
Double-vaccinated people are catching Covid too (and being hospitalised)
Covid cases in Enfield - rising very quickly
Tim Spector paints a picture of a growing incidence of infections and deaths, returning us to the situation in the spring when we were last in near complete lockdown. One in 65 people with symptomatic Covid, a quarter of them double-vaccinated. A 27 per cent increase in hospitalisations over the course of one week. Deaths averaging more than 220 a day, the highest rate since March. The once impressive vaccination campaign slowed to a "snail's pace", leaving 8 million people who now qualify for a booster jab untreated and a growing backlog.
In western Europe only Germany is now behind the UK (but restrictions are still in force there, reducing infection rates)
The UK is now well behind most west European countries as regards the proportion of vaccinated people. The combination of only 66 per cent vaccinated and very lax countermeasures (non-enforcement of masks, social distancing and ventilation) and increased mixing of people is leading to the rise in infections. Failure to vaccinate enough schoolchildren is significantly contributing to the problem. Tim Spector is calling on the government to put into effect its "rather weak" Plan B immediately.
Israel was another country notable for the impressive speed of its initial vaccination programme, but like England it relaxed restrictions before enough people had been vaccinated and finds itself now with increasing cases and hospitalisations - "ditching restrictions is problematical with only 66 per cent fully vaccinated".
With regard to the slowing vaccination rate, Tim Spector thinks that a problem is that the volunteers who were so key to initial successes are leaving because they need a rest after nine months of hard work. A new approach to vaccination is therefore needed.
Finally, the UK government is still failing to acknowledge that the symptoms of Covid infection in vaccinated people are different from those first identified when the Wuhan virus struck. It is now 562 days since Zoe informed the government of the current symptoms. Other countries have taken these on board, but in the UK people with the four most common symptoms are not being advised to isolate and are not eligible for PCR tests. Tim Spector thinks that, although these are symptoms associated with colds and flu, in the present circumstances they are more likely to be a sign of Covid. People with these symptoms are mixing and spreading the virus, the inevitable consequence being more illness and more deaths.