Earlier, Health Secretary Matt Hancock told Kay Burley that there are “promising signs we are seeing a flattening of cases since lockdown”.
But Steve Baker MP, Conservative chairman of the COVID Recovery Group, claims that with the two-week lag in reporting of cases and hospitalisations, the “flattening” of cases is down to pre-lockdown measures – not the period of national restrictions.
He told BBC Radio 4: “Government scientists briefing MPs were clear this week that the effects of lockdown would not be visible in the data until this weekend.
“Cases may have flattened since lockdown but any change is not yet because of lockdown.
“The health secretary knows this too. Cases began to drop before the effects of lockdown appear in the data.
“There is no excuse for a minister creating the impression this change was caused by lockdown. This statement should be corrected by the health secretary immediately to avoid any damaging misunderstandings about the interpretation of data.”
– One in 10 young Britons feeling lonely ‘often or always’ during pandemic
Some more social data from ONS – this time showing that around one in 10 young people in Britain now feel lonely often or all the time.
Adults aged between 16 and 29 and those with health conditions reported the highest prevalence of acute loneliness in mid-November, according to ONS data.
Overall, around a quarter of adults said they feel lonely often, always or some of the time.
Some 7% of adults said they felt lonely often or always, including 10% of young people and 12% of people with health conditions.
This is slightly down from the beginning of November, when 8% of all adults, 12% of young people and 13% of those with health conditions reported acute loneliness.
High levels of anxiety were also reported by more than a third of all adults (36%).
This was again most commonly reported by 16-29-year-olds (41%) and people with a health condition (39%).
Women were more likely than men to experience high levels of anxiety or feel lonely often or all the time, the figures show.
