Figures do not bear out No 10’s claims of ICU apocalypse

The figures, at first glance, seem terrifying. Serious coronavirus cases are rising so fast in Manchester, the Government claims, that intensive care beds will run out by mid-november. According to Downing Street, Manchester University Foundation NHS trust is already at 70 per cent occupancy, while 91 per cent of beds are taken up at Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust. Surely, a clear case for Tier 3?

The only problem with these figures is that they are actually better than the same time last year. In the last week of October 2019, 87 per cent of Manchester’s ICU beds were full and 96 per cent at Salford, according to NHS England data. And we had a very mild flu season last year, with far fewer admission and deaths than normal.

It is no wonder then that Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, has criticised the Government for its “selective statistics” and stoking fear needlessly. “Greater Manchester’s ICU occupancy rate is comparable to the occupancy rate in October 2019,” he said earlier this week. “Our hospitals work a system to manage demand.”

His words were backed up by Dr Jane Eddleston, the medical lead for Greater Manchester, who said that hospitals have a surge capacity. “The system can cope,” she said. “If one looks at the stark figures, that does not take into account the additional capacity that will come into play.”

Greater Manchester has been suffering the impact of regional lockdown measures since the end of July, with major restrictions on liberty. Yet having lived through months of local lockdown as cases rose, in recent weeks, some parts of Manchester have started to turn a corner.

In Manchester City Centre, the proportion of infections has been falling since the start of the month, and is down nearly 20 per cent in the past week, Telegraph analysis shows. Likewise, cases are down 5 per cent in Trafford and Stockport. In contrast, the numbers testing positive are rising in Oldham, Bury, Rochdale, Tameside, Bolton and Wigan. But does it make sense to put an entire region of

2.8 million people into further lockdown when more than a million live in areas with declining cases? There is a major problem with treating all of Greater Manchester as one region when there is such a big disparity.

Hospital admissions in Greater Manchester are far below Liverpool, the first area to be placed into Tier 3. The most recent data showed that around 66 people a week are being admitted to Manchester University Foundation NHS trust compared with 266 at Liverpool University NHS Trust.

Analysis by the Manchester Evening News showed that on Oct 11 there were 76 new Covid patients recorded in hospitals across the region compared with 240 on the peak day in April.

Likewise, Manchester University Foundation NHS trust has recorded just eight deaths in the past week, compared with 34 at Liverpool University Foundation NHS Trust.

Office for National Statistics figures released yesterday also showed there were few excess deaths in the North West in the week ending Oct 9, just 39 more than would be normally expected for the same week (a 2.9 per cent rise), based on the five-year average. Yorkshire and the Humber saw a 10 per cent increase in excess deaths, the West Midlands 6.9 per cent and the East Midlands 7.3 per cent.

One of the main problems hampering the Government’s ability to make sensible decisions about regional lockdown is access to timely data. Fewer than a third of tests are coming back in 48 hours, and on Sunday that figure had fallen to 16 per cent.

Prof Sheila Bird, formerly programme leader at the MRC Biostatistics Unit, University of Cambridge, said there was too much information coming out from different bodies, and called for not just the number of cases and tests to be published, but also the percentage of people testing positive to make it possible to tell how much of the increase was caused by more testing. “A weekly update would be helpful for public understanding,” said Prof Bird.

The public is being left bewildered by late and erroneous data, and millions face being locked down on unreliable and often wilfully misinterpreted statistics. The Government is close to losing public trust and with that public compliance. If that happens, it may sadly get its apocalyptic ICU predictions after all.

It is no wonder that Andy Burnham has criticised the Government for ‘selective statistics’ and stoking fear needlessly