Health Secretary Sajid Javid claimed this morning on LBC that the government’s current modelling projects daily case rates to rise “far higher than 50,000” after July 19, and that they’re “being very straight” about the risks this might pose despite the weakened link between cases and hospitalisations. However, these gloomy assumptions may well be more pessimistic than necessary…

A new graph from the Covid-19 Actuaries Response Group plots SAGE’s projections for daily hospitalisations after reopening against the real-world data, and finds that (so far) the actual number of hospitalisations is significantly lower than predicted – either for the original 21 June plan, or the current 19 July trajectory.

Still, hospitalisations are clearly increasing, and have accelerated over the last few days, though not at anything like the rate SAGE modellers forecast. The modelling above predicts a flattening out over the next few weeks, so Guido will be keeping an eye on the data to see if that bears out…