FACT CHECK Reinfections don’t seriously underestimate the number of Covid deaths
ITV News’s political editor Robert Peston said in a tweet that the number of Covid-19 cases being reported each day on the government’s Coronavirus Dashboard “seriously understates” the real number, because people who catch the disease more than once are not counted after the first time.
It is true that these reinfections are not counted as new cases on the dashboard, but it’s unlikely that they would have much effect on the overall number of Covid cases.
The proportion of cases that are suspected reinfections changes from week to week, but the overall rate has been estimated by a PHE epidemiologist at around 1%.
Mr Peston has since clarified that his concern was that “the quality of the dashboard infections data was not what it should be because of the policy driven exclusion of those who have been infected a second time”.
In a speech to Parliament on 22 July, the Labour MP Dawn Butler said that Boris Johnson “has lied to this House and the country, over and over again”.
Ms Butler did not withdraw her comments and was asked to leave the House for the rest of the day, since accusations of “deliberate falsehood” must only be made with prior permission of the Speaker, according to Parliamentary rules.
Most of Ms Butler’s claims originated from a widely viewed video from the lawyer and campaigner Peter Stefanovic. She claimed that Mr Johnson inflated economic growth and public funding under the Conservatives, and overstated the effect of vaccines.
It is often impossible to say for sure whether somebody is “lying”. However, it is correct that the majority of Mr Johnson’s claims that Ms Butler mentioned were either false or misleading.
A post on Facebook claims that a law mandating the Covid-19 vaccine has been passed through the House of Lords without an impact assessment.
This is true, but refers only to an amendment of the Health and Social Care Act which will make it a requirement for care home workers to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19 from October.
It is not mandatory for anyone else to have a Covid-19 vaccination.
