Britain's coronavirus death rate is down, but the unanswered question is why

[Northerner]

Why has the mortality rate for coronavirus decreased in the UK? The Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre has analysed data from more than 10,000 patients admitted to intensive care units in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and shown that the 28-day mortality of patients admitted to ICU has fallen from 43.5% before the April peak to 34.5% after the peak – a decrease of nine percentage points.

Some have suggested this may be due to “herd immunity” or that over time we have learned how to successfully treat this disease. But there’s scant evidence to support these claims. So what’s going on?

Emerging data suggests that some people who have not been exposed to Sars-Cov-2 have a type of white blood cell (T cell) that recognises the virus because it has previously been exposed to other coronaviruses, such as the common cold. Whether these cross-reactive T cells prevent or lessen the impact of infection in people with coronavirus is not yet known. It’s an intriguing preliminary finding, but there’s currently no evidence that we have herd immunity in the UK.

Britain's coronavirus death rate is down, but the unanswered question is why | Charlotte Summers

Some have suggested we’re now successfully treating Covid-19, or that ‘herd immunity’ has finally arrived. Neither is true, says academic Charlotte Summers

www.theguardian.com

 

[Docb]

Could simply be that with increasing experience and less pressure on the system, more people with COVID are being sent to ICU before they become critical and they are benefiting from the treatment and recovering rather than dying. Could be lots of other things.

My usual comment to this sort of reporting.... take care when looking at newspaper reports of scientific stuff. Sub editors are looking for impact rather than accuracy and leave out nearly all of the caveats. Not tried to run this one down so cannot comment on whether this one fits into that general assessment.

 

[grovesy]

From what I have seen from Medics around the world being interviewed the suggestion is that they are putting into practice what they have learned. Also Medics seem to communicating with other globally.

 

[Amity Island]

Why has the mortality rate for coronavirus decreased in the UK? The Intensive Care National Audit and Research Centre has analysed data from more than 10,000 patients admitted to intensive care units in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and shown that the 28-day mortality of patients admitted to ICU has fallen from 43.5% before the April peak to 34.5% after the peak – a decrease of nine percentage points.

Some have suggested this may be due to “herd immunity” or that over time we have learned how to successfully treat this disease. But there’s scant evidence to support these claims. So what’s going on?

Emerging data suggests that some people who have not been exposed to Sars-Cov-2 have a type of white blood cell (T cell) that recognises the virus because it has previously been exposed to other coronaviruses, such as the common cold. Whether these cross-reactive T cells prevent or lessen the impact of infection in people with coronavirus is not yet known. It’s an intriguing preliminary finding, but there’s currently no evidence that we have herd immunity in the UK.

Britain's coronavirus death rate is down, but the unanswered question is why | Charlotte Summers

Some have suggested we’re now successfully treating Covid-19, or that ‘herd immunity’ has finally arrived. Neither is true, says academic Charlotte Summers

www.theguardian.com

Hi Northerner,

Thanks again for providing regular posts for us all to read, just about every day.

The guardian article only discusses patients "with" covid19 and doesn't give the actual cause of death or reason for admission.

For all we know, the reason for the initial hospital admissions might have been pneumonia, allergic reaction, organ failure, severe road accident? Few patients would have first been admitted to hospital as a "covid19" patient, simply because they won't have been tested for covid19 until after they were admitted. From their initial hospital admission, they would have been moved into ICU. A general patient "with" (testing positive) covid19 is not likely to be a patient suffering from covid19 for the simple reason that 80% of people with covid19 don't have any symptoms.

Without the article and paper giving the actual reason for their ICU admissions or actual cause of death, it's impossible to address the reason for the drop in mortality rates.

My personal feeling (only my opinion, not necessarily fact) is that most of the early spikes in deaths were in the very elderly and because you can only die once, there is, as natural consequence of that, a fall in mortality rate.

Interestingly, 66% of those in icu having tested "positive" with covid19 were Asian.

 

[zuludog]

It could just be that all those people who were susceptible have already caught the virus and died from it
Or to put it another way, anyone who was gonna die, has died

 

[Thebearcametoo]

I suspect there are a mixture of factors. Diagnosis and treatment is better understood so that those who need it can get appropriate treatment sooner. There is space in ICU for those who need it. The R rate is down which means that not only are there fewer cases but the viral load of each case may well be lower which in turn would lead to fewer serious illnesses. We have had a huge shift in behaviours - hand washing, social distancing, mask wearing etc. But also few pupils in schools, office workers working from home where possible. Fewer people out at pubs. Fewer people on public transport. It’s been summer so socialising has been mostly outdoors. We’ve not had thousands gathering for concerts, sports etc. All of that is mitigating factors so that those who do get ill are less likely to get as ill. The real test will be once schools are back and as we head into winter with more people being indoors and then we will get more of an idea whether it’s still as dangerous.

(Care home deaths are likely to be lower because care homes are locking down at the first sign of any illness which means no visitors (even outside social distancing) at my mum’s home for a month and counting. Homes will be risk averse given the numbers of deaths seen early on.)

 

[Amity Island]

Could simply be that with increasing experience and less pressure on the system, more people with COVID are being sent to ICU before they become critical and they are benefiting from the treatment and recovering rather than dying. Could be lots of other things.

My usual comment to this sort of reporting.... take care when looking at newspaper reports of scientific stuff. Sub editors are looking for impact rather than accuracy and leave out nearly all of the caveats. Not tried to run this one down so cannot comment on whether this one fits into that general assessment.

Hi DocB,
Some very good points there about not taking things at face value. It's very rare that newpaper's report story's just for the kindness of sharing stories, it's usually because they have an angle to push or sales targets to meet.

 

[Docb]

Yes @Amity Island and the situation is not helped by academics trying to push themselves forward, usually when grant applications are being adjudicated. Used to sit on a SERC panel assessing research funding applications and you could often tell who was applying for what by what appeared in the press as institutions tried any technique they could to get their name to the forefront.