Their work has had a major public health impact by leading research to monitor the spread and predict the disease severity of the virus.

• The Pathogen Genomic Unit (PGU) led by Professor Judy Breuer hosts the COG-UK London hub rapidly sequencing SARS-CoV2 and impacting public health. The PGU supports nine hospitals across London for outbreak sequencing and has so far generated over 15,000 sequences. The PGU also leads the HOCI observational clinical trial evaluating the utility of pathogen sequencing for the management of hospital acquired SARS-CoV2 infection. Analysed data generated by the PGU was fed back to Public Health England, SAGE and the JCVI.
• Through partnership with the Francis Crick Institute Professor Eleni Nastouli and Dr Catherine Houlihan led the SAFER Study (SARS-CoV2 Acquisition in Frontline Healthcare Workers) demonstrating that healthcare workers are at a high risk of developing and transmitting COVID-19 (Houlihan et al. 2020 Lancet).
• In collaboration with the Crick, GOSH and the UCL Institute for Nanotechnology, Dr Dan Frampton described the emergence of the B.1.1.7 variant of concern (VoC) in hospitalized patients (Frampton et al. 2021 Lancet Infect Dis) and demonstrated that this VoC although more transmissible was not associated with increased disease severity in this population.
• As part of ISARIC 4C, Dr Rishi Gupta developed and validated a risk stratification tool which can be used to accurately predict the likelihood of deterioration in adults hospitalised with COVID-19 (Gupta et al. 2021 Lancet Resp Med)
• Our researchers were among the first to describe “Long-COVID” (Mandal et al Thorax 2021).
• Our researchers are seen regularly in the media providing expert opinion on the outbreak. They also sit on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) COVID vaccine subcommittee (Professor Jerry Brown) and helped develop COVID-19 vaccine policy for England and Wales (phase 1, phase 2, phase 3).