Top Sage scientist: cut isolation to seven days

Prof Neil Ferguson says as long as people complete negative lateral flow test, period could be reduced

‘All the modelling and analysis suggests if it is coupled with testing, it is not going to reduce the effectiveness of measures that much’

‘Some people are no longer infectious after three days and it makes no sense to keep them locked up

CALLS have been made for the Covid isolation period to be shortened from 10 days to seven, as hospitals and businesses struggle to maintain staffing levels.

Prof Neil Ferguson, the scientist behind Britain’s lockdowns, said that as long as people completed a negative lateral flow test, the window could be reduced.

The Imperial College London modeller, who sits on the Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), is now the most senior scientist to suggest that the 10-day rule could be relaxed. His call comes as hospital staff warn that beds are being closed and employees are being stretched to cover other specialities as a result of rising Covid cases among NHS workers forcing them into isolation.

A 28-year-old nurse from Newcastle, who is set to spend Christmas alone after testing positive for the virus, said: “We’ve been covering other specialities for months now and taking on a lot of their patients. The staffing has got acutely worse in the last few weeks. All of the wards are short-staffed at all times, some have had to shut beds.”

Desperate business leaders also called for a cut in the period of isolation, branding the current policy “lockdown by stealth”.

The British Chambers of Commerce has warned that businesses will fail unless they are given support from the Treasury amid rising cases of the omicron variant. Hannah Essex, co-executive director of the BCC, said: “What we need to hear pretty much now, over the weekend – which should have been one of the busiest weekends of the year for businesses – is what are they going to do.

“Doing nothing is not an option right now … or we will see businesses fail.”

Prof Ferguson was speaking the day after his team at Imperial published its initial findings into omicron in the UK. The scientists found evidence that the variant can evade immunity, both from prior infection or vaccination, to a “substantial extent” and said there was no evidence that omicron was intrinsically milder than delta.

Prof Ferguson’s group projects that there could be 5,000 deaths a day thanks to the new variant, despite there being only around 65 people currently in hospital with it, according to official figures released on Friday.

Sage predicts a significant increase in hospital admissions, to roughly 3,000 a day. However, a comparable increase has not played out in South Africa, where the outbreak started, and clinicians have reported that cases appear to be less severe.

Evidence has also emerged from South Africa suggesting that omicron patients’ period of infection is shorter than with previous variants.

Asked about the feasibility of reducing the isolation period to seven days, Prof Ferguson told Saturday’s Today programme on BBC Radio 4: “I think it’s always a trade-off between the effectiveness of those things and people’s adherence to them.

“I think if it could be coupled with lateral flow testing, so testing negative to release. All the modelling and analysis would suggest if it is coupled with lateral flow testing, [isolating for just seven days is] not going to reduce the effectiveness of the measures that much.”

His comments chimed with those of Prof Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, who said that omicron patients were most infectious in the first five days, after which infectiousness falls.

‘Some people are no longer infectious after three days and it makes no sense to keep them locked up,” he said.

“Isolating people for 10 days when they are no longer infectious will harm the economy and leave vital public services, such as the NHS, short-staffed.

“People could perhaps take a daily lateral flow test and be allowed to leave quarantine if they test negative for two days in a row.”