Bristol's Public Health Director urges compliance as we enter second half of national lockdown
It's thought cases could keep rising before we see the impact of restrictions
Last updated 20th Nov 2020
We must stick to the rules and avoid mixing between households if the second national lockdown is going to bring down infection rates.
That's what Bristol's Director of Public Health has told us, with two weeks to go until the current restrictions are due to end, on 2 December.
In an interview with us this week Christina Gray also told us background infection rates are higher now in our area than they were in the first wave and we may not have reached the peak yet, despite having already been in lockdown for two weeks.
"What we're focusing on very much in local authorities is to try and encourage everyone to understand the importance of our own individual, family, person and social behaviours," she said.
"The virus spreads person to person when people are together and what we need to do at the moment is minimise our social contact.
"That is hard, everybody is tired, there's a great deal of cynicism, so we're not seeing the level of response that we saw in March.
"But that is absolutely what is continuing to drive the background level of infection."
Yesterday (19/11) 19 coronavirus deaths were registered in hospitals across the South West for the second day in a row.
For context, on 5 November the day we entered the latest lockdown, five deaths were registered in our region.
"There's always a delay in any intervention," Christina added.
"If you look at the graphs of when the lockdown was put in place in March, it was at least three or four weeks before you saw any impact of that.
"And that's because there is at least a 14 day delay between any intervention and seeing any effect.
"So we're only just 14 days into quite a soft lockdown, with not very high levels of compliance."
Having suggested the lockdown could end before we start to notice its impact, we asked her if it's likely to be long enough to bring rates down.
"It's a relatively short period of time if you look at how long it took the northern authorities who were already in this place to see any impact," she said.
"I think there is evidence that this sort of intervention is effective. "We are waiting to hear what the government's new tiered framework will be and certainly they, SAGE the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies and the National Biosecurity Centre will be looking very carefully at the data.
"Background rates of infection will be one thing they are looking at."