A FIFTH of Brits have still never had Covid, officials estimate

Nearly a fifth of people in England have still never caught Covid, top statisticians believe.

It means around 10.3million have managed to dodge the virus since the pandemic began three years ago, in theory.

Rates shot up quickest during the winter of 2021, the Office for National Statistics believes. 

Thirty per cent of the country were assumed to have ever been infected before the original Omicron wave kicked off. This doubled to 60 per cent by the time it began to wind down. 

For comparison, just 6.3 per cent of people in England are thought to have had the virus by April 26 2020 — roughly a month after the first lockdown.

An Office of National Statistics analysis has calculated how each much of each Covid wave infected the population of England. The latest, Omicron BA.4/5, was the biggest infecting 46.3 per cent of the population. Individuals could be represented twice in the data having, for example, caught Covid once at the start of the pandemic, then again during the Omicron surge

The ONS estimate that under 950,000 Brits were carrying the virus on any given day in the week to January 24. This was down by 15 per cent on the week before, marking the lowest toll since mid September

The most recent total prevalence estimate stands at 81.6 per cent.

This only goes up to November 11, however, which is before the most recent wave truly kicked off.

But the ONS figures are merely estimates. 

Leanne Massie, a senior statistical officer at ONS, said: ‘Determining the total number of people infected throughout the whole pandemic is more challenging as we cannot simply add the total infections together. 

‘This is due to the increasing number of people who have had COVID-19 more than once.’

To accurately estimate how many people have had Covid, Miss Massie said they focused on those who have never been infected.

She said that based on survey data, they developed an ‘experimental’ method of removing people after they had been counted for a first infection.

‘People cannot be counted more than once using this method,’ she said, she added. 

Despite the surge in the number of people infected last year, death rates fell.

Health advisers credited the immunisation drive for drastically blunting the threat of the virus, saving tens of thousands of lives. 

But on Monday, MailOnline revealed that 13million people in England have never had a Covid jab.

In some English neighbourhoods, as few as one in three people have had just one dose of the vaccine. 

MailOnline analysis of data, based on all over-12s, found just 37.5 per cent of people living in Harehills South in Leeds have had their first jab. 

This is despite a huge campaign to get Brits to roll up their sleeves and get a Covid vaccine.

The drive was to help reduce the risk of becoming severely ill from the virus allowing the NHS and wider society to return to pre-pandemic normality. 

This chart shows the number of Covid deaths recorded since the start of the pandemic. The latest figures show about 100 deaths per day in the last week of December, up from about 40 a week in November. The increase is far cry from the darkest days in of the pandemic, January 2021 when some 1,200 daily deaths were recorded

Government data analysed by MailOnline shows Covid vaccination rates are below 50 per cent in over 20 areas of England. Harehills South in Leeds has the dubious honour being the least jabbed in the country, with only 37.5 per cent of people there having been vaccinated

But as of Sunday, booster shots will only be made available to under-50s who have conditions that leave them at a greater risk of a serious illness from the virus, in a bid to press ahead with post-pandemic life.

People in this age group still eligible for a booster include those with lung and heart conditions, diabetes, cancer patients under going radiotherapy, and pregnant women.