11 charts that show the continuing impact of lockdown

On March 23 2020, people across the UK received one simple instruction: stay at home.

Three years later, the consequences are still being felt in every aspect of our lives. Here, 11 graphs reveal the lasting impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Backlog Britain

For months during lockdown, courts, operating theatres and back offices lay close to empty.

But the need for passport renewals, medical checkups or driving tests would not simply disappear.

Rather they built up, leading to backlogs which – a year after the last Covid restrictions were removed from law – have barely shifted.

And in many cases, they’re getting substantively worse.

There are 7.2 million pending hospital appointments, up three-quarters of a million since April 2022 and double what they were in March 2020.

Crown court backlogs are lingering around 61,000 – double their pre-pandemic norm.

More than half-a-million learners are waiting for their test, four times higher than April 2020 and there has been a 25 per cent jump in potential foster parents waiting to be matched with children.

Where the UK saw a 68 per cent drop in knee replacements in 2020, Germany, France and Italy saw these fall at almost a third of this rate, according to the OECD. Similar drops were seen in hip and cataract surgery.

These backlogs are having major consequences; trust in the NHS has collapsed to its lowest level on record. Drop-out rates for crime victims are rising as trials take almost a year to be completed, up from six months pre-pandemic.

And the proportion of under-twenties with driving licences has fallen from 35 per cent to 23 per cent in two years. Last summer, holiday makers were forced to cancel holidays as passports took a month to be processed.

Health of the nation

To March 2022, Covid killed 185,276 people across the UK, according to the Office for National Statistics.

Lockdowns ensured the NHS was not overwhelmed, avoiding preventable deaths. But there were profound effects on public health, especially mental health.

Within a year of the first lockdown, the proportion of children and adults likely to have mental health problems had spiralled.

For children, this had jumped from 10.1 per cent in 2017 to 17.8 per cent in 2022.

The proportion of young adults showing depressive symptoms increased from 11 per cent to 23 per cent.

At the end of 2022, an estimated 364,000 more people are out of work due to health issues than before the pandemic.

This includes 108,000 people out of work due to mental health issues, but also tens of thousands due to physical pain and illness.

Before the pandemic, around one in 20 adults had unmet medical needs due to the NHS’s waiting list, a figure which has likely increased.

Economic meltdown

Lockdowns inevitably led to a very quick and painful economic shock across the world, as entire countries ground to a halt.

The government scrambled to minimise its impact.

In all, over £350 billion pounds of support – both for individuals and the NHS – was spent, all whilst the tax income and economic output collapsed.

As a result, relative government debt jumped to its highest point since the 1960s as borrowing hit war-time levels.

The immediate costs of lockdowns have now subsided.

Taxes have risen, in part as a response to the pandemic’s impact. They are now at the highest level relative to the economy since the Second World War.

The cost of living crisis similarly has its roots in the pandemic, following a surge in demand for everything from furniture to petrol after the lifting of restrictions.

Built-up pressures in the housing market – and increased savings seen during lockdowns – helped drive house prices to record highs, before plummeting back down.

A generation left behind

Students have now faced four consecutive years of disruption to their education – three from the pandemic and most recently through teachers strikes.

In 2022, the proportion of young pupils meeting the expected level of reading, writing and maths fell from 65 per cent to 59 per cent, with the most disadvantaged students falling further.

Pupil absences have hit a record high, with 120,000 pupils missing a half or more school sessions last year; double the pre-pandemic level.

Amanda Spielman, head of Ofsted, has blamed this on the break in the “social contract” between parents and schooling, as well as the mental health crisis.

Decline in office culture

Before the pandemic, working from home was a fringe movement – just one in eight reported doing some in the weeks leading up to lockdown.

Overnight, offices were emptied and, although guidance was scrapped last January, look unlikely to ever be full again.

Commuting rates in the capital are a good indication of how much “office culture” has declined. Three years on from the first lockdown, tube and bus journeys in London are now almost 20 per cent lower than pre-pandemic levels.

The rise of the “Tw&t” – that’s commuters who only go in on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday – is evident as almost 200,000 fewer passengers pass through the city on Mondays.

The change in working habits has posed major challenges for cafes, pubs and services serving commuters.

Pret-a-Manger shut 30 stores as soon as autumn 2020, predominantly in city centres.

But the city centre’s losses have been the commuter belts gain; Pret sales in suburban London are 11 per cent up on pre-pandemic levels.

Today, the work from home rate is roughly double what it was previously.

The rise and fall of sourdough

In 2020, as people searched desperately for ways to pass the time while stuck inside, interest in recipes for everything from banana bread to whipped coffee surged.

But this was a pandemic trend that disappeared immediately after lockdowns ended.

Today, online spin class Peloton’s shares have fallen to just five per cent of their pandemic peak. Shares in conference-call company Zoom are down 90 per cent; Netflix’s shares have halved.