Socialising indoors with more than one household in social 鈥渂ubbles鈥� during the covid-19 crisis looks unlikely to be allowed any time soon in the UK, judging by the government鈥檚 scientific advisers and new modelling.
The UK government it is mulling allowing people to meet in bubbles of up to 10 people. Its Scientific Advisory Group on Emergencies (SAGE)听 with seeing if people could expand their household group to another household, to give isolated people more social contact and help with childcare to get people back to work.
However, at a meeting on 14 May, members of SAGE strongly cautioned against introducing bubbles in the short-term until a strong test-and-trace programme is in place, 快猫短视频 has been told. Concerns were also raised about the impact on intergenerational households in particular, given the virus tends to be more deadly for older people.
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Minutes of an earlier SAGE meeting, , revealed that not enough research has been done yet to inform a UK decision on social bubbles. There are fears the bubbles could reignite the spread of the coronavirus.
鈥淎ssessment of the introduction of bubbles is not straightforward and potential unforeseen risks accompany the potential benefits,鈥� the document says. Those risks include the bubbles rebuilding networks and enabling 鈥渢ransmission through the population鈥�. There is also concern over whether people would adhere to rules around bubbles and whether these multi-household groups听would stay exclusive.
Another potential downside, the advisers note, is if anyone in the bubble showed covid-19 symptoms, everyone in the bubble would have to isolate. 鈥淭his would lead to increasing frequency of isolation for people, particularly in the winter months,鈥� according to the minutes. Ultimately, further work is needed to understand the impact of bubbles, the group agreed.
Some new insight may听come as soon as Friday with forthcoming research from Stefan Flasche at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. His team鈥檚 modelling shows that widespread bubbles in the UK would be too dangerous right now.
鈥淭he overall message is that we are in a delicate situation at the moment where our reproduction number is likely in the range of 0.7 to 0.9 in the UK. And if we would allow all households in the UK to form a bubble with another household, then there may be considerable risk that would push R above one,鈥� says Flasche. A reproduction number above one would see the number of new cases begin to grow again.
Flasche and his colleagues found that a more targeted approach would avoid that threshold being breached. He says 鈥渢hose households that have suffered the most鈥�, such as those living alone and those with young children, should be allowed to form bubbles instead. He says bubbles are a plausible strategy and, in countries such as Germany and South Korea where the infection rate is low and tracing is keeping it in check, they could work for everyone. However, he cautions: 鈥淎t least for the UK, we are bit off from that situation.鈥�
New Zealand is the best known pioneer of social bubbles for dealing with the coronavirus, but they are also being tried in , , on the Channel Island of , while across the US some people are adopting them informally.
Nicholas Long at the London School of Economics and his colleagues , surveying thousands of people. They found that听people were good at maintaining their bubbles, and that bubbles brought significant benefits. More than 85 per cent of the bubbles consisted of 10 people or fewer.
鈥淭he bubble concept really caught on in the public imagination,鈥� he says. Part of the success in New Zealand was due to bubbles being central to the whole lockdown 鈥� bubbles initially described a single household before alert levels were reduced and they were allowed to expand, he says. The other striking thing, he says, is that government messaging framed expansion as being about need rather than want. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not this , but thinking, who do you know who needs to be in a bubble with someone else 鈥� someone who is isolated, someone who is suicidal,鈥� says Long.
Long says although the New Zealand experience has been largely positive, one issue was the stigmatisation of essential workers, with some being excluded from bubbles by people over fear of contagion. He believes bubbles should translate to countries such as the UK, but there is the critical question of when to permit them, as when there had been several days with no new cases. The UK had around 2000 cases per day last week.
Long says there is also the issue of whether the recent controversy over Boris Johnson鈥檚 chief advisor Dominic Cummings reportedly breaching coronavirus guidelines will affect UK adherence to guidance on any future bubbles. 鈥淭hat wasn鈥檛 a concern when those SAGE minutes were written, but it is a legitimate social science question to ask now.鈥�
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