China Daily, April 13 -- Since the beginning of this year, the United Kingdom has been gradually lifting the new crown epidemic prevention measures, and Prime Minister Boris Johnson (Boris Johnson) has lifted all remaining epidemic prevention restrictions in England on February 21, including self-isolation, close contact tracking and free rapid testing after testing positive for the new crown. Speaking in the House of Commons, Johnson said he wanted Britain to "learn to live with the virus". This means that many people in England no longer wear masks and no longer have to self-isolate when they leave work or go to school or when they have symptoms.
Pictured: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Source: Reuters
According to a report by the British Sky News channel on April 6, after the implementation of the "lying flat" policy in the United Kingdom, the new crown case rate in England reached the highest level ever, and experts warned that the number of hospitalizations and deaths would increase. Testing in England between 8 and 31 March showed that 6.37 per cent of people had contracted COVID-19 during this period, the highest level ever recorded since the COVID-19 pandemic. That compares to 4.41% in January.
Increased prevalence among people over 55 years of age Hospital overcrowded again
According to data from the latest react-1 study from Imperial College London, the prevalence of older people shows an increase in the prevalence of death, which is more likely to develop a serious illness.
Responding to the findings, Dr Layla McCay, Director of Policy at the NHS Alliance, said: "With almost 20,000 people now hospitalized in England for COVID-19, the NHS and its exhausted staff are once again struggling to cope with the increasing number of admissions and bed occupancy.
"NHS leaders and their teams are upgrading their COVID-19 services and reopening COVID-19 wards, but the government must be mindful that the chronic staffing shortage, coupled with the current backlog of 6.1 million waiting lists, really needs to have a realistic conversation about the current state of health services."
The weekly infection rate of people aged 30 years and older has almost doubled and the number of re-infection cases has also surged
ABC News reported on April 2 that as COVID-19 cases continue to increase in the UK, the country is also experiencing a surge in the number of re-infections.
According to a weekly report released by the Health Security Agency on 31 March, there were more than 50,000 cases of re-infection in England each week in the week ending 20 March 2022, accounting for 10.7% of all cases. The data are based on laboratory-confirmed reinfection, i.e. two positive tests more than 90 days apart. According to the comparison of data, the number of re-infection cases in England has shown a surge, and the number of re-infection cases in the United Kingdom in the last week of February is less than 20,000.
The report shows that weekly infection rates are rising in all age groups, and in people aged 30 and older, weekly infection rates have almost doubled.
When British Prime Minister Boris Johnson lifted the lockdown order, Professor Daniel Altmann from imperial college London's Department of Immunology and Inflammation said it had led to "confusion" about how to prevent re-infection.
"It means people are confused about safety — many people go out to work and school knowing they're infected, and even fewer people wear masks," he told ABC News. "When people think about ..... This seems like an untenable policy when the Omiljunn mutates the strain, and the Omiljung has some mild symptoms, but the body's immunity to it is not good, sometimes re-infecting people again every few weeks. ”
As a result of the "three big problems", the prevalence in the UK will continue to increase
Experts said that the dominance of the more contagious BA.2 strain, the continuous weakening of the human body's anti-virus ability and the complete relaxation of the new crown epidemic prevention measures will continue to increase the number of new crown pneumonia infection cases in the UK.
The subtype variant of Omikeron, BA.2, has become the most dominant variant in England. Dr Ali Mokdad, an epidemiologist at the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington in Seattle, told ABC News that the spread of the Omiljung BA.2 subtype has undoubtedly played a role in the rising trend of re-infected populations in England. "The BA.2. subtype variant strain is more contagious, so more people may be infected by exposure to it; it takes much less time than you and I sit together and get infected," he said.
Dr Mukhdad said many people received a second or even a third dose 5 to 6 months ago and their immunity has now weakened. Mukhdad also said: "We know from the data – we have a lot of evidence, including from the UK – that from 3 months, your immunity, especially against infections, will decline rapidly; after 5 months, your immunity to infections will basically drop to 20%." ”
Image: Streets of London on January 27, 2022 Source: Reuters
A january report by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) found that two doses of AstraZeneca' vaccine, the vaccine that most Britons administer, were effective in fighting the Omiljung strain from 50% to almost no effect in 20 weeks.
After England eliminated a series of measures such as self-isolation after testing positive, close contact tracking and free rapid testing, the behavior of the British people has gradually changed, and the "lying flat" of the epidemic policy has exacerbated the surge in new crown infections.
The epidemic situation in the UK may be like a mirror, as Mukhdad said, suddenly lifting the epidemic restriction order, people are tired and have changed their behavior. Suddenly, there were 30 to 40 percent of susceptible people, because of weakened immunity, in fact they did not come into contact with the epidemic Ofikron BA.1 and BA.2 variants, and then they saw a rapid increase in the number of confirmed cases...
In the face of the more contagious and faster-spreading Omilon variant, the "lying flat" policy of Western countries is absolutely not desirable. "Lying flat" can never lie down to win, and coexisting with the virus will only pay more for life. For a country with a population of more than 1.4 billion, "lying flat" will pose a huge health risk to the elderly and other vulnerable groups, and must be paid great attention to. Once the virus spreads widely, it will affect the demand for other normal medical and health services and the run on medical resources, and other harms caused by it must be considered. Taking other countries as a mirror and adhering to the "dynamic clearance" is the best choice for the mainland to fight the epidemic at present.
(Editor: Han He, Ma Rui)