South West R Rate and growth rates still highest in country - Cornwall Live

The South West still has the country's highest R Rate and growth rate per cent per day, according to the latest data released by the Government.

However, the Government says the estimated South West figure is "insufficiently robust to inform policy decisions" due to "low case numbers and/ or a high degree of variability in transmission across the region".

And a number of other regions also now have the same R rate range, albeit with lower growth rate per cent per day ranges.

The latest modelling has the current R Rate for the South West - a large geographic area that includes Devon and Cornwall along with a number of other countries and major cities like Bristol - at between 0.8 and 1.1. This is the same as last week.

However, the growth rate per cent per day range has risen from between -4 and +1, to between -3 to +3.

One new COVID-19 coronvirus death was reported in the South West today, but this was not in Devon or Cornwall - where the last death in a hospital was reported on June 29, more than five weeks ago.

Region	R	Growth rate % per day
South West*	0.8-1.1	-3 to +3
North West	0.8-1.1	-3 to +1
London*	0.8-1.1	-4 to +1
South East	0.8-1.0	4 to 0
North East and Yorkshire	0.8-1.0	-4 to 0
Midlands*	90.8-1.0	-3 to 0
East of England*	0.7-0.9	-4 to -1
England	0.8-1.0	-3 to 0

* Low case numbers and/ or a high degree of variability in transmission across the region means these estimates are insufficiently robust to inform policy decisions.

The reproduction number, referred to as R, for the UK as a whole is between 0.8 to 1 - but Government advisers Sage have said they are is not confident that R is currently below one in the region.

The estimates for R and growth rate are provided by the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling (SPI-M), a subgroup of Sage.

It said: “We are starting to see early indications that these values may be increasing.

“This is not yet reflected in these estimates because the data used to calculate R and growth rate reflect the situation from a few weeks ago.”

A time delay between initial infection and the need for hospital care usually means it may take between two to three weeks for the changes in the spread of Covid-19 to be reflected in the estimates.

But models that use Covid-19 testing data, which have less of a time delay, indicate higher values for R in England, the Government Office for Science statement said.

It added: “For this reason, Sage does not have confidence that R is currently below one in England.

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“We would expect to see this change in transmission reflected in the R and growth rate published over the next few weeks.”

However, the Government officials and advisers said is also important to recognise that these are estimates, and there is a high degree of uncertainty with them.

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2020-08-07 15:51:38Z
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