Levels of worry about Covid-19 are decreasing

Coronavirus daily tracker: 9th April 2020

Over half of UK adults (52%) say they are worried about Covid-19. This is the lowest level of worry we have recorded since 24th March, just after the lockdown was announced.

We are now consistently seeing three in ten supermarket goers (30%) reporting no empty shelves.

Similarly, just under half (49%) say they are working from home when they wouldn’t ordinarily, down 10 pts from yesterday. Conversely, 28% reported their work requiring them to attend their regular place of employment.

Two in five (39%) say that that their disposable income has not been affected by Covid-19, consistent with last two weeks of data but down 13 pts from when we first started tracking (52%) on 18^th March.

A similar proportion (42%) say that their disposable income has decreased due to Covid-19. Again, this has remained stable over the past two weeks but is still a significant increase on the 27% who said the same on 18^th March.

While the number of people who say they are self-isolating is up 1pt on yesterday (41% vs 40%), this is still down 11pts from our highest recorded figure of 51% on the 30^th March.

Women are significantly more likely than men to say that they are self-isolating – 48% vs 35%.

Alongside an overall reduction in those who say they are self-isolating we have also recorded an increase in activity from those who are leaving the house. Supermarket visits (+7%), visits to other shops (+3%) and visiting friends and family (+2%) all up from two days ago.

We are now consistently seeing three in ten supermarket goers (30%) reporting no empty shelves – indicating that initial fears about supermarket supplies are beginning to subside.

Sir Keir Starmer’s approval rating (18%) is some 26 points above what Jeremy Corbyn’s was when we stopped tracking him (-8%), although Starmer’s is still below all of the big names in government – including Michael Gove (22%).

Despite a dip earlier in the week (down to 42%) the government’s overall approval has come back into the 50s consistently over the last three days, and now sits on 54%.

We will be updating our coronavirus tracker daily and weekly as this unprecedented pandemic unfolds. The full data set can be downloaded here. Please get in touch for more information.