Wednesday April 22nd




Headlines

  • Despite a slight fall in hospital deaths, down to 763 yesterday, the Government continue to come under pressure to include deaths in care homes etc
  • Including all deaths the real death toll is at least 21,573 not the 18,100 being reported
  • UK deaths amount to 12% of the total of Covid-19 deaths worldwide (this compares to 3% for Germany)
  • Germany has had 6 deaths per 100,000 population, compared to the UK which has had 33 per 100,000
  • There have now been 179,866 deaths worldwide from the virus
  • The 7-day average of deaths in the UK (a more stable representation of deaths than the daily figure) shows a slight fall over the past week giving some cause for hope that the peak of the virus in the UK has been reached
  • There are over 2.5 million confirmed cases worldwide of which 133,495 are in the UK. This amounts to 5% of all confirmed cases in the World.
  • The rate of infection is still not known, so it is not clear how many people may have the virus or what the effect of lifting the lockdown could be.
  • The lockdown has been eased in Italy, Spain, Germany and China
  • Just over 400,000 people have now been tested, amounting to 0.61% of the population
  • There were 13,522 people tested in the past 24 hours, although over 22,000 tests were carried out. The disparity is explained by the fact that many people are tested more than once.
  • Of those tested 25% are positive, this compares with 18% testing positive at the end of March
  • Testing is only being carried out on selected individuals including healthcare workers
  • There are still shortages of PPE and tests being widely reported

Quote of the Day

"the headline given to the public each day… does not include some of the oldest and most vulnerable in society" Conservative MP William Wragg, pointing out to the Government that they are systematically under reporting the deaths of older people in care homes by only giving the figure for hospital deaths


UK Stats


DateDays since first deathWeekly comparison figures
22/04/202048
  
Deaths18,1005,232deaths in the past week
Note: these are hospital deaths only, the Government's preferred measure. The real death count, if deaths in care homes etc are included is closer to:UK Hospital deaths as % of Worldwide deaths12 
Deaths adjusted to include non-hospital deaths21,573Germay deaths as % of Worldwide deaths3 
New deaths (official)76329% of deaths in the past week
Adjusted daily deaths*909   
Death Rate**13.56729Average new deaths each day (over past 7 days)
Adjusted death rate16.16 
Increase in deaths over previous day (%)4.4 
Total tests carried out (persons)411,19297,423people tested in the past week
  in last 24 hours13,522The Government set itself a target of 100,000 tests per day by the end of April
How many less than Governments target86,478   
  average per day since first death8,567   
Negative (n/%)68 -29% negative tests
Positive (n/%)25 36% more positive tests
  
Percent population UK tested0.61%0.14of the population tested since last week
*The adjusted death rate has been recalculated based on figures released on 21st April by ONS and the daily new deaths therefore takes this into account.                              **Please note that the death rate cited here is the number of deaths amongst those who have tested positive in tests. It should not be inferred from this that this is the proportion of the population who are likely to die.


Seven Day Trend



4 Nations


CasesIncrease in cases over prevous day (%)DeathsNew deathsPercentage increase in deaths over previous day
England99,137316,2716654
Scotland9,0384985708
Wales8,1243624152
N. ireland2,8742220136
Data from 22nd April

English Regions

 Total confirmed casesIncrease over previous day (%)
 London 22,3521.27
 South East 14,0532.91
 South West 5,2293.65
 North West 15,2092.85
 East 8,2183.15
 Midlandss 16,0933.91
 North East/Yorkshire 13,7775.51


Article of the Day

Today’s read is by John Wight who has written for a variety of newspapers and websites, including the Independent, Morning Star, Huffington Post, Counterpunch, London Progressive Journal, and Foreign Policy Journal. He is also a regular commentator on RT and BBC radio.
This is his take on sinners and saints in his most recent blog. I enjoyed it.

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