Scotland fans ‘very clearly’ linked to surge

The rise in positive coronavirus tests in Scotland is “very clearly” linked to Scotland fans travelling to London for the Euro 2020 match against England, a public health expert has said.

Martin McKee, professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the spike in positive cases “coincides very much” with the incubation period of the virus after the match at Wembley on Friday June 18, which finished 0-0.

He was asked if the Euros tournament was “acting as some kind of super-spreader with the number of fans that have been travelling around the continent”.

Prof McKee told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme yesterday: “I think you in Scotland know very clearly that that is the case.

“We also have another example of Finnish fans who went to one of the Euros matches and 300 of them were infected.

“We can see very clearly in the Scottish data, because the increase coincides very much with what you would expect with the incubation period after the match but also the gender difference, because the cases, the increases seem much greater in men than in women.

“So I think when you put those two together it’s pretty clear that’s what’s been happening.”

Thousands of Scotland fans travelled to the UK capital for the fixture last month despite warnings not to if they did not have a ticket.

Scottish Government figures published on Thursday show there were 4,234 positive tests over the past 24 hours – meaning the country recorded more than 4,000 positive tests for the first time since the start of the pandemic.