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An end of week thread on why London is the region I’m LEAST worried about when it comes to covid ‘overwhelming’ NHS services later in the month 1/7
First thing to say is that things are VERY bad in London and still getting worse, with bed occupancy up 27% in a week. HOWEVER, the weekly rise seven days ago was 43% - which suggests growth is slowing fast. 2/7
Looking at the other six NHS English regions, ALL of them are also seeing increased bed occupancy and all but one are growing at a faster rate than a week ago 3/7
The other region where weekly growth is slowing is Kent, it has gone from 34% to 25%. The Midlands is pretty flat, so PERHAPS we’ll be ok there too 4/7
Now, let’s take a look at the other four regions (in ascending order of concern). The north east and Yorkshire is up 14%, 5 percentage points higher than seven days ago 5/7
The north west is up 22% (8 percentage points higher), the east up 39% (11%) and, most worrying of all, the south west is up 32%, which represents a 26 percentage point jump 6/7
The numbers will jump around – and London is going to be the worst affected region for at least the next 10 days or so – but other regions will soon be in the same boat 7/7
