Coronavirus: Leading expert who advises UK response and was with Boris Johnson on Monday self-isolates

‘Developed a slight dry but persistent cough [and] high fever at 4am,’ tweets Professor Neil Ferguson

The leading expert who helped inspire a major change in the government’s response to the coronavirus outbreak is now self-isolating after developing a persistent dry cough and a fever.

Neil Ferguson – the professor of mathematical biology at Imperial College London who saw Boris Johnson on Monday – said there was “a lot” of people working in Westminster now developing the virus.

“Sigh. Developed a slight dry but persistent cough yesterday and self isolated even though I felt fine,” said Professor Ferguson on Twitter. “Then developed high fever at 4am today. There is a lot of COVID-19 in Westminster.”

Professor Ferguson’s Imperial College London (ICL) coronavirus response team published a paper showing that 250,000 people in the UK could die if efforts were focused only on slowing down the spread of Covid-19.

The ICL paper analysed the most up-to-date data from Italy, and concluded that the only “viable strategy” was a policy of “suppression” of the virus – elements of which have now been adopted in the government’s social distancing measures.

Professor Ferguson said it had become apparent that the previous tactics adopted by the government would result in a “very large number of deaths and the health system being overwhelmed”.

Asked if the new, more draconian measures should have come earlier, the professor told the BBC: “I overall think we have got the timing about right.

“I think we’re about three weeks or so behind Italy, two weeks behind France and Spain, so we are making these decisions in a more timely manner than other European countries but certainly there wasn’t any time to lose.”

The ICL paper said: “In the UK, this conclusion has only been reached in the last few days, with the refinement of estimates of likely ICU (intensive care unit) demand due to Covid-19 based on experience in Italy and the UK (previous planning estimates assumed half the demand now estimated) and with the NHS providing increasing certainty around the limits of hospital surge capacity.

“We therefore conclude that epidemic suppression is the only viable strategy at the current time.”

The government’s chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance said on Tuesday officials now hoped the death toll in the UK could be kept under 20,000.

“That’s a good outcome,” he said.