COVID-19 second wave '90% lower than spring with more people now surviving'

 Experts claim the true scale of the coronavirus peak in Europe in March was ten times the current second wave.

Across the continent there are currently around 300,000 new cases a week.

But health experts claim an estimated three million caught the disease in one week in the spring, with most cases going undiagnosed.

The genuine spread of the deadly virus will never be known because mass testing is now far more advanced than during the first outbreak.

Despite the huge death toll, just 200,000 cases were confirmed in a week Europe during the first outbreak.

That news comes as daily infections in the UK surged to a record 7,143 — a whopping 77 per cent increase from 4,044 positive cases the day before.

The UK is now registering record case numbers, with the most in the peak of the outbreak just over 6,000 according to official figures.

However testing shortfalls then meant only the very seriously ill in hospital were tested at some stages.

It is widely thought that the true figure for the UK in late March to early April was 80-100,000 cases a day.

Last week Sir Patrick Vallance said less than eight per cent of the UK population had contracted the virus and developed antibodies - but this amounts to about four to five million people.

Officially, the UK has recorded only 446,000 cases.

Experts have described the surge in positive tests as “sobering” but it is set against new data compiled by the Economist from all of the 27 EU countries.

This new figures reveal that there are currently 300,000 weekly new cases across the continent from a total population of 480 million.

It also shows the virus is less deadly with survival rates increasing from 66 per cent in March to 84 per cent in August thanks to medical advances.

Conservative MP Henry Smith told the Sun : “We need to get better balance and perspective over the impact of the second wave. It is one tenth the size of the first.

“My concern is the damage to other health conditions and the economy will cause far more harm than Covid-19 during its second reduced wave.”

World Health Organisation special envoy Dr David Nabarro said he was against imposing more stringent rules.

He said: “This war, and it’s reasonable to call it a war, against this virus is not going to be won by creating tougher and tougher rules that attempt to control people’s behaviour."

Health officials in the UK also agreed the latest figures are not comparable to the peak because of less testing in April and May.

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