Covid: Public need to see expert guidance on Wales rules - Plaid

A group of scientists and researchers offer guidance to Welsh government to inform decision-making

Latest scientific details should be made available so people can see why new Covid restrictions are needed in Wales, Plaid Cymru has said.

The Welsh government's Technical Advisory Cell (TAC) regularly publishes guidance, but it has not been publicly updated since 10 December.

First Minister Mark Drakeford has announced a number of new tougher measures in Wales from 26 December.

Mr Drakeford said the report will be published shortly.

Experts from TAC briefed the leaders of the Welsh Conservatives and Plaid Cymru on Wednesday morning.

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The modelling published by TAC offers projections about the expected number of new cases, hospital admissions and deaths.

'Rapidly evolving'

It also sets out how these might change depending on which new restrictions are introduced, or other ways in which people's behaviour could alter.

Mark Drakeford announced new post-Christmas guidance at Wednesday's coronavirus briefing

But Mr Drakeford said the Omicron variant meant ministers were dealing with "a rapidly evolving state of understanding" and "the model is constantly being updated".

"It had a certain assumption about the rate we would be able to roll out boosters and we're obviously exceeding that by a significant amount," he said.

"The model will need to be recalibrated to take account of that.

"It also has assumptions about people's behaviour and I think we've seen in the last couple of weeks that actually, people's behaviour is more sensitive to the risks of Omicron than maybe we would have thought."

Other issues that needed to be revisited included changing data over how long Omicron patients would need to stay in hospital and whether they recovered more quickly, he added.

"We will publish the model, but it's even more precautionary at the moment than it would have been at other parts of the coronavirus experience."