Football fever could be behind summer Covid wave

England fans getting together to watch the football could help the spread of the new 'Flirt' variant - Action Images via Reuters/Paul Childs

Euro 2024 could be behind the summer Covid wave, a leading scientist has suggested.

Experts have previously warned a summer wave is “building” as hospital admissions increased by a quarter within a week.

Cases are anecdotally high amid a surge in a “Flirt” variant known as KP.3, although a lack of testing has made it hard to confirm.

Prof Mark Woolhouse, an infectious disease epidemiology expert at the University of Edinburgh and former adviser to the Government on Covid-19, said the uptick appeared to be coinciding with the European Championship, just as it did in 2021.

“The surveillance of Covid cases in the UK is far less intensive than it once was, so it is difficult to track the rise and fall of waves of infection, to assess the severity of different variants, or to know how effective the vaccines are against them,” he explained.

“Even so, there is a widespread impression of a growing 2024 summer wave, much as we saw in 2021 when there was also a Euros football tournament, and evidence that this contributed significantly to the spread of infection.”

The Euros in 2021 was credited with increasing waves of infection - Getty Images/Alishia Abodunde

England have featured in four games at prime time slots so far and are set to face Switzerland in the quarter-finals on Saturday evening when large groups are likely to come together again.

The number of people hospitalised with Covid was 3.31 per 100,000 in the week ending June 16 – up from 2.67 the week before – and was higher among the elderly, peaking at 34.70 in the over-85s.

There was also a 29 per cent surge in positive cases in the week to June 22, although most testing is now done in hospital and healthcare settings.

Dr Jamie Lopez Bernal, a consultant epidemiologist for immunisation at the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), said it was “seeing an increase in Covid-19 across all indicators, including hospitalisations”.

Experts fear existing vaccines may not provide the same level of protection against new variants, which are several mutations away from those that initially spread.

The main “Flirt” variants, known as KP.2 and KP.3, accounted for a combined 40 per cent of Covid in April – the last time UKHSA published a breakdown of the variants.

While KP.2 was the more prevalent of the two then, it is believed that KP.3 is the driving force behind a summer wave.

Both are mutations from the previously dominant JN.1 variant, and scientists believe they allow the virus to spread more easily.

Prof Woolhouse added: “The waves continue to be driven by a combination of new variants and a partial waning immunity to infection.”

He said there would be “continuing circulation of the virus and fluctuating levels of disease, hospitalisations and deaths” until there is a shift where most people have been exposed to Covid while they are young.

“It will result in a build-up of immunity that will make them much less vulnerable when they are elderly and frail. Even so, we may continue to offer vaccines to the most vulnerable groups. But to all intents and purposes Covid-19 will become just another common cold.”

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