Real-time tracking of a pandemic, as data accumulate over time, is an essential component of a public health response to a new outbreak. A team of statistical modellers at the Medical Research Council Biostatistics Unit regularly nowcast and forecast COVID-19 infections and deaths. This information feeds directly to SAGE sub-group, Scientific Pandemic Influenza sub-group on Modelling (SPI-M) and to regional PHE teams.

The work uses a statistical programming model called a transmission model (Birrell et al. 2020), data on daily COVID-19 confirmed deaths from PHE (by NHS region and age group), and published information on the risk of dying and the time from infection to death, to reconstruct the number of new COVID-19 infections over time; estimate a measure of ongoing transmission (R); and predict the number of new COVID-19 deaths in different regions and age groups.

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Graph of estimated number of new COVID-19 infections in England             Graph of predicted deaths in England (red dots – observed)

                         

The blue lines show when interventions have been introduced (lockdown on 23 Mar and the relaxation of measures on 11 May), and the red line shows the date these results were produced (11 Jan)

Copyright © MRC Biostatistics Unit, University of Cambridge

• Report on Nowcasting and Forecasting – 14th January 2021
• Report on Nowcasting and Forecasting – 21st December 2020
• Report on Nowcasting and Forecasting – 11th December 2020
• Report on Nowcasting and Forecasting – 26th November 2020