Covid, because a ‘perfect storm’ will arrive for British virologists in autumn

Inside Autumn a real could come perfect storm caused by a new peak of cases of covid which could be “devastating” for the UK.

This is the alarm raised by British experts, as reported by the newspaper The mirrorwho point the finger not only at the overall decline in testing, but also in the inadequate surveillance of new and possible variants immune-evasion.

According to the latest available data, the percentage of people testing positive for the coronavirus rose by 37% in England in the week ending 17 September, when around one in 65 people had the virus. However, it is far below the 3.8 million weekly infections recorded in early July and hit with the peak of the wave of Omicron BA.4 and BA.5although we are beginning to notice an increase in the number of hospitalizations.

Across the country, eight hospitals declared critical issuesafter being forced to cancel some operations and asking people to avoid going to the ER unless there is an emergency situation.

Teacher Tim Spector, The co-founder of the Covid ZOE app, in particular, is convinced that the UK is already at the beginning of the new wave of the pandemic.

“It seems that we are at the beginning of a new spike in infections – he explained to theIndependentt-. Many people are still using government guidelines symptoms but they are wrong. At the moment, Covid starts in two-thirds of people with pain throat. Fever and loss of smell are very rare: which can lead many seniors to think they don’t have Covid. But believing it to be a common flu, they don’t go through swabs.”

Not only. According to Spector, the first available data show that new subvariants of Omicron are becoming immune-evasive and could cause “real problems” in the UK as the UK approachesWinter.

the teacher too Lourenço Young, The Warwick University virologist explained that two subvariants of Omicron – known as BA.2.75.2 derived from BA.2 and BQ1.1 derived from BA.5 – are causing concern in the early data, showing signs of being able to escape the immune system. “What does it mean that we’re not out of danger yet”, he added.

For this reason, both experts asked the government to take greater responsibility for the cold winter months, even asking them to return to using the masks indoors, poorly ventilated and crowded.