Sheffield health chief hopes spring will be a turning point in the fight against Covid-19
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Director of Public Health Greg Fell said rates had flatlined from mid December but were now going back up and he expected that to continue for the foreseeable future.
He told a full council meeting: “When will it end? I don’t know, if I had to guess I would say late spring, but that is a guess.
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Hide Ad“There needs to be a very high level of vaccine coverage, probably more than 70 or 80 per cent of the eligible groups will need to be vaccinated, and even then we’ll still need to be careful.”
Currently, the rate is 230 cases per 100,000 in Sheffield but Mr Fell warned the new variant was spreading very rapidly.
“It’s significantly more transmissible and the more transmissible, the more dangerous to individuals – more people will get it and there will be more net harm.
“Lockdown was probably inevitable given the epidemiology in south east England but it absolutely depends on our behaviour.
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Hide Ad“In March we were scared. Now we’re significantly more used to the virus, we’ve lived with it for nearly a year. I don’t know whether we’re scared but it’s still dangerous, it still kills people.
“The impact of lockdown will have the desired impact on infection rates but it comes at the cost of social and economic harm and we need to be very mindful of that.”
Mr Fell said there were no “miracle answers or shortcuts” to defeating the virus but the vaccinations were developing fast and spring would help as people started to go outdoors more.
“The core fundamentals are the same – test, trace, isolate; wash hands, face coverings and social distancing. Those things work.
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Hide Ad“The level of flu and gastrointestinal infections have fallen so it shows it really makes a difference washing our hands a lot.”