Covid-19 in the UK: How many coronavirus cases are there in your area?
By The Visual and Data Journalism Team
BBC News
- Published
There have been nearly 1.7 million confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK and more than 60,000 people have died, government figures show.
However, these figures include only people who have died within 28 days of testing positive for coronavirus and other measures suggest the number of deaths is higher.
Find out how the pandemic has affected your area and how it compares with the national average:
New cases falling
After the first peak in April, cases started rising again in July, with the rate of growth increasing sharply in September and October, before falling again in November.
On Friday, the government announced a further 16,298 confirmed cases.
It is thought the infection rate was much higher during the first peak in spring, but testing capacity at the time was too limited to detect the true number of daily cases.
The data for cases can also be broken down by region, as shown in the chart below.
Comparing the change in those figures by week shows that infections had fallen in every region in England at the beginning of December.
Cases also appeared to have fallen in both Scotland and Northern Ireland, but there was a small rise in Wales.
The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which is tracking Covid-19 in the community, also suggest infection rates are falling in all regions of England apart from the North East and among all age groups.
Approximately one in 105 people in homes in England had coronavirus in the week ending 28 November, according to the ONS. That's about 520,000 people.
In Scotland, it was one in 130 people for the same time period, while in Wales the figure was one in 170 and in Northern Ireland it was one in 190.
Daily deaths have risen
The average number of daily deaths began to rise again in September, following the first peak in April.
On Friday, the government announced a further 504 deaths.
Of these, 424 deaths were in England, 41 in Scotland, 33 in Wales, and six in Northern Ireland.
The BBC's Head of statistics Robert Cuffe says that so far, the second waver has been lower and slower than the first.
Almost 10,000 coronavirus deaths a week were registered in consecutive weeks in April.
In this second wave, it looks like the peak figures - assuming infections keep falling before widespread vaccination takes place - might be closer to 3,000 than 4,000.
Rules were amended over the summer to include deaths in the coronavirus total only if they occurred within 28 days of a positive test. Previously in England, all deaths after a positive test were included.
England has seen the majority of UK deaths from Covid-19. Using the 28-day cut-off, there have been about 53,000.
Hospital admissions vary around UK
Although hospital admissions for Covid-19 remain below the levels seen in the spring, there are big regional disparities.
The North West, North East and Yorkshire, and Midlands have seen the highest number of admissions but the situation in all three appears to be improving.
Where are cases still high?
Cases increased across large parts of the UK in autumn but they have fallen in recent weeks.
The darker orange and red areas on the map below show those currently seeing the highest number of cases per 100,000 people.
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Restrictions were increased across the UK in an effort to tackle the rising number of cases and they remain tight in most places.
In England, each local authority has been placed in one of three tiers following the end of the recent national lockdown.
In Wales, a range of increased measures have been introduced, including a ban on pubs, restaurants and cafes serving alcohol.
In Northern Ireland, a further two-week "circuit-break" lockdown began on 27 November.
Scotland has a five-tier system of alert levels with different measures in place in different parts of the country.
UK leaders have agreed to allow up to three households to meet indoors during a five-day Christmas period of 23-27 December.
Overall death toll could be over 75,000
When looking at the overall death toll from coronavirus, official figures count deaths in three different ways.
Government figures count people who died within 28 days of testing positive for coronavirus.
But there are two other measures.
The first includes all deaths where coronavirus was mentioned on the death certificate, even if the person had not been tested for the virus. The most recent figures suggest there had been almost 70,000 deaths by 20 November.
The second measure counts all deaths over and above the usual number at the time of year - that figure was more than 75,000 by 20 November.
The most recent figures available from the ONS are for the third week of November, which show there were 14,276 deaths registered in the UK.
Some 3,038 of these deaths involved Covid-19 - 199 more than the week before.
Deaths normally do rise at this time of the year, but the data from the ONS and its counterparts in Scotland and Northern Ireland show the second wave of the virus has pushed the death rate above the average seen over the past five years by about 21%.
Overall, the figures are still well below the peak of 9,495 deaths recorded in a week, reached on 17 April.
What is the R number in the UK?
The "R number" is the average number of people an infected person will pass the disease on to.
If R is below one, then the number of people contracting the disease will fall; if it is above one, the number will grow.
The government's current estimate for the R number across the whole of the UK is 0.8 to 1.
The estimates for England, Scotland and Wales are also currently 0.8 to 1, while in Northern Ireland it is 0.9 to 1.1.
The government has said in the past that the R number is one of the most important factors in making policy decisions.
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