According to a study by some of the UK government’s scientific advisers, one in 15 people living in London could already be infected by coronavirus.
Researchers at Imperial College London’s Covid-19 response team, estimated in a paper that between 1.2 percent and 5.4 percent of the UK’s population may have already been infected with COVID-19 by 28 March.
Based on the report, one in 15, which equates to around 600,000 people could have the virus in London.
“We estimate there are orders of magnitude fewer infections detected than true infections, mostly likely due to mild and asymptomatic infections as well as limited testing capacity,” the paper said as quoted by the Financial Times.
According to the FT, the report suggests border lockdowns have already saved between 21,000 and 120,000 lives.
According to the World Health Organization, the United Kingdom has 29,478 COVID-19 cases. The death toll stands at 2,532.
Johns Hopkins University reports the number of cases of coronavirus in the UK at 34,173 and a death toll of 2,926.
On Wednesday, the UK Defense Ministry announced the mobilization of 3,000 reservists to help the country respond to the disruption caused by the outbreak.
Earlier, the UK Department of Health and Social Care reported the largest day-on-day increase in both the number of new COVID-19 positive tests and the number of deaths caused by the disease.
