TL&DR: A bit of sunshine, longer days and warmer weather and good news – all Covid indicators are down, and so we are over this strange wave’s crest. Flu, RSV and Scarlet fever cases are also down. Spring has finally arrived!
Covid
The number of reported cases in England has been declining over the last couple of weeks. Scotland is not yet there completely, but the numbers are declining in many age classes; the decline is masked by the increase in 15-19 age group.
A similar decline is now also visible in Pillar 1 cases, positivity and admissions. I suspect both positivity and hospitalisation numbers might still be revised upwards next week, but we are clearly at the wave crest.
So, it looks like this “strange” wave is now peaking. Compared to the other Omicron outbreaks, the initial growth rate was clearly lower this time, and the numbers at the peak were lower as well.
It will be interesting to consider what happens next, but any speculation are beyond the scope of this post.
Influenza, RSV, Scarlet Fever, …
All the other infectious diseases I monitor here are declining, following their pre-pandemic seasonal pattern. RSV is still high compared to other years, but not unusual.
Finally, I did not have time to update the Rhinovirus graph this week, so just simply copying from the UKHSA report.
The reported common cold cases until recently were high compared to a pre-pandemic 2018-19 season (and pre-lockdown 2019-20), but now seem to go down. The “usual” summer Rhinovirus season is still before us, and it will be interesting to see how it pans out this year.
