Wellcome Longitudinal Population Study COVID-19 Steering Group and Secretariat

Our objective is to provide an efficient coordinating body ("secretariat") for the continued development, deployment, collection and analysis of a shared COVID-19 questionnaire across UK cohorts. The value of undertaking this in multiple longitudinal UK cohorts is that data can be collected in extremely well characterised members of the population across a wide demographic range who are already engaged in research, who have had data and biological samples collected on them, who have an established collection of record linked data already record linked and who sit behind supported infrastructure able to undertake novel data collection and research. Each of these cohorts is research active and collectively offers a depth or domain expertise not available within any one cohort, including that of UK Biobank. In this first coordination of COVID-19 research in deeply characterised UK cohorts, we identified the added value of a core questionnaire prospectively aligned to capture data pertinent to understanding COVID-19, as well as the direct and indirect consequences of the pandemic on health, wellbeing, social and economic outcomes.