London: Britain’s health authorities announced that they will stop publishing regular data on the COVID-19 pandemic in the new year as the country’s people have learned to live with the virus with the help of vaccines and medicines.
Britain’s UK Health Protection Agency (UKHSA) said it will continue to monitor Covid, like other common viral diseases such as the seasonal flu.
Data on fertility rate or R value was published as a monitoring tool fortnightly since April this year.
Dr Nick Watkins, chair of the UKHSA Epidemiology Modelling Review Group (EMRG) said, “During the pandemic, the R value and growth rate served as a useful and simple indicator to inform public health actions and government decisions.”
“Now that we have reached the stage of living with Covid-19 with the help of vaccines and medicines, surveillance has gone down. Still closely monitored by many different indicators, the publication of this particular data is no longer required.”
The EMRG said that its latest detailed review has concluded that the publication of data related to COVID-19 will be stopped with effect from January 6, 2023.