Patients Now Dying of Coronavirus Were Infected a Month Before Lockdown

Experts have said that the patients that are currently dying to coronavirus were infected a month ago, before the UK lockdown. 

Professor James Naismith, director of the Rosalind Franklin Institute at the University of Oxford, spoke out as the UK coronavirus death toll rose to 1,228. There are currently 19,522 confirmed cases of the virus.

Professor Naismith notes that he is ‘confident’ that the social distancing measures put in place by the government will see the daily increase in deaths begin to come to a halt, however they were not in place when the most recent victims’ contracted to virus.

Professor Naismith continued: “It can take up to two weeks from infection to onset of symptoms. For over 80% of people these symptoms are mild, for the much smaller number who develop the most serious illness, intensive care is needed around 10 days later.

“For those who do not recover but die, data from China suggests this takes around another four days. The tragic deaths today will be from people infected roughly a month ago. It is inevitable that there will be more tragedies for families ahead.”

He added that if they people of the UK continue to follow government advice they can help to ‘reduce the final death toll.’

Author badge placeholder
Written by

George Day

Comments