Scottish Covid deaths rise as booster vaccine take-up falls

Additional figures out from Public Health Scotland show there were 459 acute hospital admissions due to Covid in the week ending 7 July, a slight drop on the previous week’s figure when 462 were reported.

Prof Antonia Ho, clinical senior consultant in infectious diseases, at the University of Glasgow, said the latest Covid wave was likely to be due to new variants and waning immunity from vaccination and infection.

She said: “I think it’s disappointing that the number of people that have taken up the spring booster has declined and I think that’s true across the country.”

In England there is a similarly low uptake of the spring booster. Data published by the UK Health Security Agency shows 37.7% of eligible people did not receive the spring vaccine, as of 3 July.

“We don’t have a very good handle on how much infection there is because there is so little testing now. We’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg,” Prof Ho added.

“Covid hasn’t settled down into a winter seasonality like other respiratory viruses like flu or RSV so we’re seeing waves outside of winter and the wave is causing severe disease in some individuals as some people are being admitted to hospital.

“We know vaccines are the best armour that we have to fight against severe disease and hospital admissions but immunity from vaccines doesn’t last very long and that’s why we need to keep giving boosters.”