London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Sunday, Aug 10, 2025

80% of cases in Trafford are among white community and ‘middle class complacency’ is being blamed

The coronavirus outbreak in Greater Manchester should be a warning to the ‘complacent white middle class’ that Covid-19 is not just spreading in ethnic minority households, one of the region’s health chiefs has said.
Eleanor Roaf, the director of public health in Trafford, said 80% of its infections in the last week were in the white community. A major incident was declared in Greater Manchester on Sunday after a rise in new cases across ‘multiple localities’.

Much of the coverage has focused on Oldham, where officials said two-thirds of infections were in the town’s Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities.

Roaf said this was not the case in Trafford, one of the wealthiest and whitest of Greater Manchester’s 10 boroughs.

She told the Guardian: ‘We are continuing to see more cases than we would like and what’s worrying is our positivity rate is going up. That is the number of people per hundred that test positive.

What you want to try to do is keep that to about 1%. We are at 3% at the moment. ‘The Trafford narrative is that it is a very white outbreak in Trafford. In other places the narrative is quite different.

One of the anxieties is that we don’t end up with a complacent white middle class thinking it’s not affecting them because they think it’s about overcrowding in ethnic minority families.’ Eighty-one people tested positive in Trafford in the last week of July – the third biggest number in Greater Manchester, after Manchester (178) and Oldham (130). Ninety-two per cent of cases had ethnicity recorded and of those 80% were white.

Ms Roaf said many of the cases in Trafford were among 17 to 22 year olds but now more people in their 30s, 40s and 50s are testing positive.

She suspects young people going out to pubs and bars are getting infected and then passing it on to their parents. She said blaming the spread on deprived, over crowded areas was damaging because ‘anyone can get it’ – highlighting a rise in cases in Altringham and Hale, where footballers and actors live.

Nine of the Greater Manchester’s 10 local authorities are in the top 20 areas with the highest coronavirus infection rates in England, according to NHS data for the week to Friday 31 July.

On Sunday, a major incident was declared, giving authorities the power to close public parks, pubs and specific places of work if there is deemed to be a ‘serious and imminent threat to public health’ from Covid-19.

Health chiefs had already banned all 2.8 million residents in the region from meeting anyone from different households indoors.

The surprise local lockdown, which also applies to areas of West Yorkshire and Lancashire, was criticised for being announced with just three hours notice on Thursday, the night before the Muslim festival Eid al-Adha began.

A Conservative MP came under fire last week for blaming immigrants, Muslims and ethnic minorities on the north-west’s spike in coronavirus cases.

Craig Whittaker, MP for West Yorkshire’s Calder Valley, said the ‘vast majority’ of people breaking social distancing rules were from the BAME community and that minorities were not taking the pandemic seriously.

Critics were quick to point out photos of crowds of people, many of whom are white, failing to follow social distancing guidelines at pubs and on beaches. Others claimed areas with the highest rates of infection had predominately white populations.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Street justice isn’t pretty but how else do you deal with this kind of insanity? Sometimes someone needs to standup and say something
Armenia and Azerbaijan sign U.S.-brokered accord at White House outlining transit link via southern Armenia
Barcelona Resolves Captaincy Issue with Marc-André ter Stegen
US Justice Department Seeks Release of Epstein and Maxwell Grand Jury Exhibits Amid Legal and Victim Challenges
Trump Urges Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan to Resign Over Alleged Chinese Business Ties
Scotland’s First Minister Meets Trump Amid Visit Highlighting Whisky Tariffs, Gaza Crisis and Heritage Links
Trump Administration Increases Reward for Arrest of Venezuelan President Maduro to Fifty Million Dollars
Armenia and Azerbaijan to Sign US-Brokered Framework Agreement for Nakhchivan Corridor
British Labour Government Utilizes Counter-Terrorism Tools for Social Media Monitoring Against Legitimate Critics
OpenAI Launches GPT‑5, Its Most Advanced AI Model Yet
Embarrassment in Britain: Homelessness Minister Evicted Tenants and Forced to Resign
President Trump nominated Stephen Miran, his top economic adviser and a critic of the Federal Reserve, to temporarily fill an open Fed seat
The AI-Powered Education Revolution: Market Potential and Transformative Impact
Chikungunya Virus Outbreak in Southern China: Over 7,000 Hospitalized
French wine makers have seen catastrophic damage to vines that were almost ready to be harvested after the worst fires in more than 70 years burned through the south of the country
US Lawmaker Probes Intel CEO’s China Ties Amid National Security Concerns
Brazilian President Lula says he’ll contact the leaders of BRICS states to propose a unified response to U.S. tariffs
Trump Open to Meeting Putin as Soon as Next Week, with Possible Trilateral Summit Including Zelenskiy
Katy Perry and Justin Trudeau spark dating rumors, joining high stakes world of celeb-politician romances
US envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Moscow to seek a breakthrough in the Ukraine war ahead of President Trump’s peace deadline
WhatsApp Deletes 6.8 Million Scam Accounts Amid Rising Global Fraud
Nine people have been hospitalized and dozens of salmonella cases have been reported after an outbreak of infections linked to certain brands of pistachios and pistachio-containing products, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada
Karol Nawrocki Inaugurated as Poland’s President, Setting Stage for Clash with Tusk Government
Trump Signals JD Vance as ‘Most Likely’ MAGA Successor for 2028
US Charges Two Chinese Nationals for Illegal Nvidia AI Chip Exports
Texas Residents Face Water Restrictions While AI Data Centers Consume Millions of Gallons
U.S. Tariff Policy Triggers Market Volatility Amid Growing Global Trade Tensions
Tariffs, AI, and the Shifting U.S. Macro Landscape: Navigating a New Economic Regime
Representative Greene Urges H-1B Visa Cuts Amid U.S.-India Trade Tensions
U.S. House Committee Subpoenas Clintons and Senior Officials in Epstein Investigation
Sydney Sweeney Registered as Republican as Controversial American Eagle Ad Sparks Debate
Trump Accuses Major Banks of Politically Motivated Account Denials and Prepares Executive Order
TikTok Removes Huda Kattan Video Over Anti-Israel Conspiracy Claims
Trump Threatens Tariffs on India Over Russian Oil Imports
German Finance Minister Criticizes Trump’s Attacks on Institutions
U.S. Proposes Visa Bond of Up to $15,000 for Some Applicants
U.S. Farmers Increase Lobbying Amid Immigration Crackdown
Elon Musk Receives $23.7 Billion Tesla Stock Award
Texas House Paralyzed After Democrats Walk Out Over Redistricting
Mexican Cartels Complicate Sheinbaum’s U.S. Security Talks
Mark Zuckerberg Declares War on the iPhone
India Rejects U.S. Tariff Threat, Defends Russian Oil Purchases
United States Establishes Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile
Thousands of Private ChatGPT Conversations Accidentally Indexed by Google
China Tightens Mineral Controls, Curtailing Critical Inputs for Western Defence Contractors
OpenAI’s Bold Bet: Teaching AI to Think, Not Just Chat
Tesla Seeks Shareholder Approval for $29 Billion Compensation Package for Elon Musk
Nvidia is cutting prices on its RTX 50-series graphics cards after sales slowed and inventories piled up
Ghislaine Maxwell Transferred to Minimum-Security Prison Amid Ongoing DOJ Discussions
U.S. Tariffs Surge to Highest Levels in Nearly a Century Under Second Trump Term
×