Live music and football could be fuelling a summer wave of Covid-19 as people gather to watch Euro 2024 and festivals like Glastonbury. The rate of infection in Cornwall has shot up by more than 50 per cent in one week.
New Covid variants like FLiRT and LB.1 are driving a recent rise in infections across the UK, with more people reporting cold-like symptoms associated with the virus. It has been suggested that the new variants may be able to evade immunity, causing some people who have been vaccinated to get ill.
The rate per 100,000 people in Cornwall for the week ending June 30 was 7.14. The previous week it was 4.7, meaning an increase by 52 per cent.
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Experts also fear that during the summer the new strains of Covid may have found a breeding ground among large groups of people coming together at large festivals and to watch live football. Dr Mariyam Malik, an NHS and private GP at Pall Mall Medical, said coronavirus can spread rapidly over the summer months.
She said: “Increased travel and big events such as festivals often result in crowded settings where the virus can spread more easily, and there are no longer any legal restrictions like wearing masks and social distancing.”
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Figures from the UK Health Security Agency show that Copeland in Cumbria now has the highest rate of infections in the country. In the week ending June 30, there were 32.75 infections for every 100,000 people living in Copeland. That has doubled from a rate of 14.89 infections per 100,000 people the previous week.
The council areas with the next highest rates were also in Cumbria. Second was Allerdale (30.09) and then Carlisle (19.95).
Gedling in Nottinghamshire (18.76) and Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire (18.70) had the fourth and fifth-highest rates in the country.
You can compare rates for all areas using our interactive map
But while a summer rise in Covid infections is alarming, Paul Hunter, a professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, told the Times that Covid “will never be as serious as it once was”.
However, he did caution that the elderly and vulnerable remain at heightened risk.
Professor Hunter said: “If you are under 40 the risk of death is minuscule. If you are over 75 the risk is real and significant.”
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