Coronavirus cases jumped again today in Britain as official statistics show the average daily number of infections has topped 800 for the first time in a month.
Department of Health chiefs confirmed another 670 Britons had tested positive for the life-threatening disease — down from yesterday’s six-week high of 938. But the rolling seven-day average now stands at 802 and has been on the rise since it fell to a four-month low of 546 on July 8.
The UK also recorded another 89 deaths, meaning 60 people are dying a day on average. Just nine deaths were recorded yesterday — but counts are always lower on Mondays because of a recording lag at weekends. For comparison, Government figures show 119 victims were announced last Tuesday.
It comes as official data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) today showed weekly coronavirus deaths in England and Wales have tumbled to their lowest rate since before lockdown.
There were 217 Covid-19 deaths registered across the two nations in the week ending July 24 — 2.4 per cent of all deaths in that time period. This is a 26.4 per cent fall from the previous week when there were 295 deaths where coronavirus was mentioned on the death certificate.
The last time deaths involving coronavirus were so low was in the week ending March 20, before lockdown, when there were 103 deaths. For comparison, more than 1,000 people died every day in the UK for 22 consecutive days during the height of the crisis in April.
The ONS report also showed that the overall number of confirmed or suspected victims stands at around 56,000. Department of Health officials says the laboratory-confirmed death toll — which only includes victims who have tested positive for the disease — is 46,210.
Despite deaths continuing to fall, there is growing concern that a Covid-19 resurgence is beginning to emerge in the UK because of an uptick in cases. Nearly 1,000 people were diagnosed with the virus in the UK yesterday, the highest number in six weeks.
But due to the roughly three-week time period, it takes for a patient to fall seriously ill and pass away, deaths might not trickle into the data for several weeks yet. Figures also show only 100 patients are still being hospitalised each day, a rate which has barely changed over the past fortnight.
