COVID: How badly has Britain performed
Now that Britain has become the fifth country to pass the grim milestone of over 100,000 deaths from COVID 19, we ask how badly has Britain performed?
When COVID was first identified the John Hopkins University at Baltimore, Maryland, started to compile statistics from all over the world. Their figures show that the UK has recorded the fifth highest number of deaths after the USA, Brazil, India and Mexico – countries with much higher populations than Britain.
More significant is the death rate per million people. Recording methods vary from country to country and some countries (including the UK) have changed their recording methods during the pandemic. Many figures that you may see compare the 152 countries worldwide with a population of over one million. Belgium fares worst with 1812 deaths per million followed by Slovenia (1618) and the UK (1471) as of 26th January. If countries of less than one million are included, Britain would rank as the fourth highest, with the city state of San Marino ranked worst hit in the world.
Another measure is the fatality rate among those tested positive, but variations may reflect the amount of testing undertaken as more testing will identify a high number of milder cases. It may also reflect the ability of health systems to cope.
Britain’s fatality rate is 2.7%, higher than the USA (1.7%) and Israel (0.7%). Highest is war torn Yemen (29%).
So was there anything that made Britain more susceptible to COVID?
There are many unsubstantiated suggestions.
Inequality is often cited. It is true that once COVID established itself it has disproportionately affected poorer sections of British society. It is also true that inequality has risen in the UK since its lowest point at the end of the 1970’s. But inequality in Britain is close to the European average.
Older people are the most vulnerable, yet the UK does not have a large proportion of older people by European standards.
Overcrowding and population density is also cited as a factor. Yet the average household size in the UK is 2.7 – the ninth lowest in the world – with only 3% living in overcrowded accommodation, and the population density in urban areas is relatively low. Only 15% of UK residents live in flats, lower than any EU country except Ireland, and the UK has the highest proportion of people living in semi detached houses in Europe at 60%.
SAGE have found evidence that multigenerational households (with an age difference of 20 or more years) are especially vulnerable, reflected in the fact that the Bangladeshi and Pakistani populations have taken the largest hit. But their countries of origin have not been as badly affected.
So what went wrong?
Maybe decisions made before and during the pandemic contributed to the death rate.
Up until a few years ago, studies consistently rated the NHS at the top or near the top of health systems in comparable countries. On the eve of the pandemic, we still had relatively low waiting times, lower drug costs due to the NHS using its significant buying power and little discernible difference in access to medical care across social and economic groups.
But the NHS started to fall behind during the years of austerity, with just 2.7 hospital beds per 1000 people (the EU average is 5.2) and half the number of doctors per 1000 compared to the EU average. Stocks of PPE had also been run down. No one anticipated the pandemic, so large stocks were seen as unnecessary.
Many people have argued that the Government acted too late and that travel restrictions should have been sooner and better enforced. You can decide on that yourself.
There’s a long way to go yet, and a final “league table” may be a long way off, and heavily influenced by the success of vaccination programmes. The return to some sort of new normal may be gradual – “don’t expect a return to “eat out to help out”!
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