By Tony O’Riley-
Professor Jonathan Van Tam today said hospital admissions were as a result of infections 3 weeks ago, as he made reference to an increase in cases which he said are being recorded now than in the spring because due to more testing.
Highlighting a lag between cases and deaths, Professor Tam said that as patients become ill with Covid-19, they don’t immediately go into hospital. And they don’t die when they arrive in hospital.
jonathan Van-Tam, England’s deputy chief medical officer, has said that comparing the first wave experienced by the UK in spring with the current rise in cases is like comparing “apples and pears” because there is now more testing available.
Showing a graph of the number of cases by specimen date in the UK, he said: “This is where are are in terms of cases by date.
“I want to be very clear with you that as patients become ill with COVID-19 they don’t immediately go into hospital, it takes some time before they become ill enough to go into hospital, and they don’t die in hospital the moment they arrive.
“Some unfortunately do die, but not instantly, and the point I’m trying to make here is that there is a lag between cases and when we see hospital admissions rise and when we see deaths rise.
“So based on the curve that’s there, if I were to say to you these are the infection we have now, then actually the hospital admissions we have now are related to the cases we had about three weeks ago.
“The hospital admissions we have now relate to a time when there was fewer COVID-19 cases
The eminent professor added that Britain may have to live with coronavirus for “several years”, one of the country’s most senior medical advisers has warned.
Deputy chief medical officer Jonathan Van-Tam told the daily Downing Street press conference that the world “can’t be sure we will get a vaccine”, despite people “hoping and praying” that Covid-19 will “just go away.
But the reality is that, certainly, until we get a vaccine, and only if we get a vaccine that is really capable of suppressing disease levels will we ever be what we might call ‘out of this’?
“From that perspective we may have to live, and learn to live, with this virus for the long-term and certainly for many months to come, if not several years.
“A vaccine may change that but we can’t be sure we will get a vaccine.”