Coronavirus is spreading much slower from person to person in the UK due to the lockdown, a new study has found.
Researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine estimated that someone with the virus in the UK will now spread it on to less than one person - a dramatic drop.
This figure - the reproduction number - may now stand at around 0.62 according to the researchers, whose study has not been peer reviewed.
The global reproduction number for Covid-19 was between 2 and 2.5 in early March, the World Health Organisation said.
Professor John Edmunds from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, who led the research team, said: “If we see similar changes across the UK population, we would expect to see the epidemic to start to decline.
But Mr Edmunds warned Brits against complacency.
“However, our estimates are not to be read as ‘job done’," he added.
"Rather, they should be used as motivation for us all to keep following UK government instructions. It’s imperative we don’t take our foot off the peddle.
"We must continue to stop transmission of the virus to reduce the burden on the NHS now, and over the coming months.”
The study was based on a comparison of the social contacts made by 1,300 people over a single day with the contacts the same people made on various days in 2005 and 2006, according to a project from that time.
The researchers admit that their study has several weaknesses, including the question of whether social activity 15 years ago is comparable to how people live in 2020.
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Researchers were also unable to measure contacts between adults and children. It is also possible that respondents misremembered social contacts, as they were reporting on the previous day.
