ArticlePloS one2022
Estimating the effects of lockdown timing on COVID-19 cases and deaths in England: A counterfactual modelling study.
Article in PloS one, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Effectiveness of non-pharmaceutical interventions as implemented in the UK during the COVID-19 pandemic: a rapid review.Journal of public health (Oxford, England) · 2025Pooled it
- Establishing a Preparedness Program: Lessons From COVID-19 to Strengthen Global Strategies for Future Pandemics.Cureus · 2025Review
- Assessing the Feasibility and Acceptability of a Bespoke Large Language Model Pipeline to Extract Data From Different Study Designs for Public Health Evidence Reviews.Cochrane evidence synthesis and methods · 2025Article
- Evaluating the COVID-19 responses of Belgium, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, February-June 2020: a counterfactual modeling study.BMC medicine · 2025Article
- The attributes of public health leadership.European journal of public health · 2025Article
- Systems Thinking in Public Health Comment on "Using System Dynamics to Understand Transnational Corporate Power in Diet-Related Non-communicable Disease Prevention Policy-Making: A Case Study of South Africa".International journal of health policy and management · 2025Article
- Principles and Pragmatics for Building Trust in Authority Comment on "Placing Trust at the Heart of Health Policy and Systems".International journal of health policy and management · 2025Article
- Non-pharmaceutical interventions to reduce COVID-19 transmission in the UK: a rapid mapping review and interactive evidence gap map.Journal of public health (Oxford, England) · 2024Review
- Learning policy lessons from the pandemic: the UK's COVID Inquiry.European journal of public health · 2024Article
- "I'll meet you at our bench": adaptation, innovation and resilience among VCSE organisations who supported marginalised and minoritised communities during the Covid-19 pandemic in Northern England - a qualitative focus group study.BMC health services research · 2024Article
- Assessing resilience of a health system is difficult but necessary to prepare for the next crisis.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2023Article
- Comparison of the 2021 COVID-19 roadmap projections against public health data in England.Nature communications · 2022Article
- COVID-19 severity is associated with population-level gut microbiome variations.Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2022Article
- Economics and economists during the COVID-19 pandemic: a personal view.Swiss journal of economics and statistics · 2022Article
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Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundDuring the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, the United Kingdom experienced one of the highest per-capita death tolls worldwide. It is debated whether this may partly be explained by the relatively late initiation of voluntary social distancing and mandatory lockdown measures. In this study, we used simulations to estimate the number of cases and deaths that would have occurred in England by 1 June 2020 if these interventions had been implemented one or two weeks earlier, and the impact on the required duration of lockdown.
methodsUsing official reported data on the number of Pillar 1 lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 and associated deaths occurring in England from 3 March to 1 June, we modelled: the natural (i.e. observed) growth of cases, and the counterfactual (i.e. hypothetical) growth of cases that would have occurred had measures been implemented one or two weeks earlier. Under each counterfactual condition, we estimated the expected number of deaths and the time required to reach the incidence observed under natural growth on 1 June.
resultsIntroducing measures one week earlier would have reduced by 74% the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in England by 1 June, resulting in approximately 21,000 fewer hospital deaths and 34,000 fewer total deaths; the required time spent in full lockdown could also have been halved, from 69 to 35 days. Acting two weeks earlier would have reduced cases by 93%, resulting in between 26,000 and 43,000 fewer deaths.
conclusionsOur modelling supports the claim that the relatively late introduction of social distancing and lockdown measures likely increased the scale, severity, and duration of the first wave of COVID-19 in England. Our results highlight the importance of acting swiftly to minimise the spread of an infectious disease when case numbers are increasing exponentially.
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