A MAP created by Imperial College London has predicted whether parts of Sussex will become "Covid-19 hotspots" this month.

Data on daily reported cases, weekly reported deaths and mathematical modelling is used to forecast the probability of weekly coronavirus rates in local authority areas across the UK surpassing 100 in the week leading up to March 20.

Coronavirus rates are an expression of the number of new cases in an area in relation to its population, and are calculated by dividing the number of new weekly cases by the area's population, then multiplying this by 100,000.

The map also predicts the chance of the R number - the average number of people that one infected person will pass on a virus to - in each local authority rising above one.

Figures in Sussex

The map makes pleasant reading for people in most areas of Sussex, with only one local authority area given a more than 10 per cent chance of being a "Covid-19 hotspot 100" in the week ending March 20.

A "Covid-19 hotspot 100" is an area which has a rate of more than 100 new weekly cases per 100,000 population.

Worthing has the highest chance of surpassing this figure in the coming weeks with 47 per cent. And the chances of the R rate being greater than one were put at 51 per cent by the Imperial College London study.

This comes after a sharp rise in the number of recorded cases in the town over the last week.

In the most recent complete figures, covering the week up to February 26, Worthing recorded the second highest week-on-week rise in England, with its rate increasing from 76 to 108.5.

This is the data given by the Imperial College London for all local authority areas in Sussex:

  • Worthing was given a 47 per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a 51 per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Brighton and Hove was given a six per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a 17 per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Adur was given a four per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a 12 per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Arun was given a six per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a five per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Chichester was given a zero per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a one per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Horsham was given a zero per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a one per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Crawley was given a seven per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a five per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Mid Sussex was given a three per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a nine per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Lewes was given a one per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a six per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Wealden was given a zero per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a one per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Eastbourne was given a zero per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a four per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Hastings was given a nine per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a 16 per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one
  • Rother was given a 0 per cent chance of having a weekly coronavirus rate of more than 100 in the week up to March 20, with a five per cent chance the area will have an R rate greater than one

This is the most recent date on coronavirus rates from all local authority areas in Sussex.

From left to right, it reads: name of local authority; rate of new cases in the seven days to February 26; number (in brackets) of new cases recorded in the seven days to February 26; rate of new cases in the seven days to February 19; number (in brackets) of new cases recorded in the seven days to February 19.

  • Worthing, 108.5, (120), 76.0, (84)
  • Crawley, 96.1, (108), 131.7, (148)
  • Arun, 87.1, (140), 132.5, (213)
  • Hastings, 74.5, (69), 61.5, (57)
  • Mid Sussex, 51.6, (78), 83.4, (126)
  • Eastbourne, 47.2, (49), 49.2, (51)
  • Lewes, 46.5, (48), 67.8, (70)
  • Brighton and Hove, 46.1, (134), 50.2, (146)
  • Chichester, 43.8, (53), 70.2, (85)
  • Adur, 42.0, (27), 54.4, (35)
  • Rother, 32.3, (31), 34.3, (33)
  • Horsham, 27.8, (40), 39.6, (57)
  • Wealden, 23.5, (38), 49.5, (80)

These figures are considerably lower than those recorded across Sussex at the start of the third national lockdown in January.

In the week leading up to January 9, all local authority areas in the county reported coronavirus rates of more than 400 new cases per 100,000 population, with the rates in Crawley and Eastbourne surpassing 800.

These have dropped significantly with the introduction of stricter lockdown measures and now the mass rollout of the coronavirus vaccine.

Yesterday, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group Professor Andrew Pollard described real-world data on the effectiveness of the Oxford and Pfizer vaccines as "stunning".

He welcomed a new study from Public Health England (PHE) which found that protection against developing symptomatic Covid-19 in the over-70s was around 60 per cent for both Oxford and Pfizer after a single dose, while among the over-80s the vaccines offered more than 80 per cent protection against hospital admission.

Professor Pollard told BBC Radio 4's Today programme the findings were "stunning", and this was for two reasons.

"First of all, because these data come from the hardest group to protect - those who are the most frail, the oldest adults in our population - and we're seeing an 80 per cent reduction in hospitalisation in that group, which is stunning," he said.

"Second... both of the vaccines performed exactly the same, there was no daylight between them.

"We've had all this difficulty with communication, particularly around Europe, with uncertainty about the evidence, whereas in the UK we've been rolling out both vaccines in the confidence that they would both give high levels of protection.

"And that's absolutely what we've seen now in this real-world evidence - that whether you've had a Pfizer vaccine or the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine, you have very high levels of protection."