A leading scientist has said the high Covid-19 case numbers and deaths in the UK are “very worrying” and warned “we just don’t really know what’s going to happen” as winter approaches.
Professor Peter Openshaw’s comments come a day after it was announced a further 111 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for the virus and a further 33,904 had tested positive.
Asked about the figures, the scientist, specialising in lung immunology, told Times Radio: “I think it’s very worrying.
“This is a very large number. If you think, 34,000 people, that’s a lot of people testing positive, and to be seeing over 100 deaths a day at this stage, you know before schools have gone back, while the weather is still relatively good, we’re not back into winter yet.
“I think we’re all really anxious about what’s going to happen once we return to normality.”
He added: “We’re going into the winter with really very high levels of infection out there in the community and we just don’t really know what’s going to happen.”
Earlier this week - Professor Neil Ferguson, an infectious disease modeller and epidemiologist from Imperial College London, also warned of a potential large Covid wave in the autumn.
Prof Ferguson said the UK could still see “quite substantial transmission going into the autumn and coming up to the winter”.
This is despite more than 47 million people in the UK receiving at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine so far.
