Technical briefing no. 2 as a pdf is available from Public Health England (PHE) : Investigation of novel SARS-COV-2 variant: Variant of Concern 202012/01
This includes the Preliminary findings of matched cohort study where they compared two groups of patients, one with the previous, or wild type, of SARS-CoV-2 and the other with the variant.
For fatalities : The 28-day case fatality was assessed for variant cases and comparator cases.
Analysis was restricted to 2,700 cases with a full 28 days elapsed since the specimen
date. Among variant cases, 12 of 1,340 (0.89%) variant cases died within 28 days of
their specimen date compared with 10 of 1,360 (0.73%) wild-type comparator cases;
this difference was not signfiicant.
From the summary:
Preliminary results from the cohort study found no statistically significant difference in
hospitalisation and 28-day case fatality between cases with the variant (VOC
201212/01) and wild-type comparator cases. There was also no significant difference in
the likelihood of reinfection between variant cases and the comparator group.
It ties in with the NervTag Update 2:-
The same day Ferguson and others were squealing children are getting it more the report said no statistically significant difference in age could be found.
2 *pre-prints* out today claiming its abou 50% more infectious.
The first one is a model from Imperial authored by Ferguson so might as well treat it as bog roll.
Second one here:-
To me they still tell us nothing - its assuming any increase in spread v existing variants means its more infectious but we know from other variants this simply isnt always the case.
A brief glance so far for me but it still seems relatively weak data wise, there's a hint but no more than that.
Actually forgot to add, if it is more transmissible its potentially self-inflicted.
By keeping up all the lockdown and distancing nonsense its quite likely we're artificially selected for a variant that CAN spread easier in those conditions.
It confers a selective advantage if it can infect with a lower viral load/have a higher load/travel further.
We're trying to fight nature and wont win.
Nature will always win no matter how much man tries to control it. Mother nature is far more powerful.i had this conversation today with a friend.. mother nature reigns supreme..
2 *pre-prints* out today claiming its about 50% more infectious.
The first one is a model from Imperial authored by Ferguson so might as well treat it as bog roll.
Second one here:-
Actually, all 7 rounds of REACT-1 community swab testing for virus are pre-prints. Nearly everything from Imperial College hasn't been reviewed independently.
