PRIME Minister Boris Johnson is due to address the nation from Downing Street tonight after the UK recorded the highest number of daily COVID-19 cases since the virus outbreak began, although in Cornwall and Devon the latest recorded weekly death toll remains in single figures.
Today’s will be the Government’s 100th coronavirus briefing since the start of the outbreak and comes as Britain is placed on red alert and is braced for further local lockdowns after the UK recorded 7,143 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus as of 9am yesterday (Tuesday). It should be noted, however, that far more testing is now being done than back in the spring.
For the first time since announcing the ‘Rule of six’ England-wide ban on gatherings of more than six people three weeks ago, the Prime Minister is expected to lead today’s COVID-19 press conference alongside chief medical officer for England Prof Chris Whitty and chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance.
Areas expected to join North East England in having tougher local restrictions banning households from mixing indoors include Merseyside, and the four North Wales local authority areas of Denbighshire, Flintshire, Conwy and Wrexham will go into lockdown from 6pm tomorrow (Thursday).
Health chiefs are also set to consider new measures next week to further restrict mixing between households in London.
Meanwhile, in Cornwall and Devon four new deaths relating to COVID-19 have been registered this week, latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures reveal. However, it is the fifth week in a row that there were no new deaths from the virus recorded in Cornwall itself, and the 14th week in a row that COVID death figures across the two counties have been in single figures.
The latest recorded deaths relate to the week of September 12 to 18, but were registered up to September 26, and indicate that three of the 318 deaths from this period occurring in the two counties saw COVID-19 being mentioned on the death certificate. These three deaths were all in care homes in Plymouth.
As for the fourth COVID death to be mentioned in the latest South West figures, it occurred in the person’s own home in Mid Devon in mid-July but was only registered this week.
In total, 581 deaths from coronavirus have been registered across Devon and Cornwall since the outbreak began, with 306 occurring in hospitals, 229 in care homes, 45 at home, and one in a hospice.
Of this total number of deaths, 210 have been registered in Cornwall, 95 in Plymouth and 19 in West Devon. The Isles of Scilly have so far had no COVID-19 deaths.