Coronavirus (COVID-19) state of the epidemic 25 February 2022

Looking ahead

Scottish Contact Survey

Changes in patterns of mixing and adherence to restrictions will impact on future case numbers. The Scottish Contact Survey measures times and settings that people mix where they could potentially spread Covid-19. Average contacts from the most recent Panel B cohort of the Scottish Contact Survey (week ending 16 February) indicate an average of 5.0 contacts.

Mean contacts have decreased within the work and other setting (contacts outside home, school and work) by 41% and 7% respectively within the last two weeks. Contacts within the home have remained at a similar level over the same period, but contacts within the school setting have almost tripled in the last two weeks. Those within the 30-59 age group reported an increase in mean contacts within the last two weeks by at least 13%. All remaining age groups reported a reduction in contacts over the same period, with 18-29 year olds decreasing the most by 19%. This decrease was largely driven by a fall in mean contacts within the workplace.

Modelling the Epidemic

Due to the different timings of the publication of Scottish data streams, SPI-M-O has been unable to produce a consensus for hospital admissions and deaths in Scotland over the next four weeks. A change in data trend between Friday 18 February and Monday 21 February affected the individual modelling outcomes, and so different projections were outputted depending on the time in which the data was downloaded. SPI-M-O will look to produce projections for Scotland again next week.

In the absence of the SPI-M-O consensus, it has not been possible to corroborate the Scottish Government's Medium Term Projections and we will therefore look to produce these projections again from next week.^[66].

Long Covid

According to the Office for National Statistic (ONS), long Covid is defined as symptoms persisting more than four weeks after the first suspected coronavirus (Covid-19) episode that are not explained by something else.

Estimates on the proportion of people in the private residential population in Scotland that experience long Covid symptoms are published by the ONS Covid-19 Infection Survey on a monthly basis. The next scheduled release of long Covid data from the Covid-19 Infection Survey is expected to be summarised in this report on 4 March. For information on the most recent estimates, see the State of the Epidemic report published on 4 February 2022.

Weekly modelled estimated for Scotland are also usually published in the Modelling the Epidemic report, which can be found here. However, a report on the rate of long COVID has not been included this week. This will resume again once updated estimates of self-reported long COVID prevalence amongst those infected with the less severe Omicron variant become available.