The UK’s coronavirus death toll has risen by 136 today – the fourth day in a row daily fatalities have topped 100.
It is more than double the increase in deaths two weeks ago on October 2.
The figure tallies fatalities across all settings, including hospitals, care homes and the wider community.
Cases have risen by 15,650 over the last 24 hours and a further 844 patients have been hospitalised with the virus. Yesterday, there were nearly 19,000 new cases reported.
New cases are surging across the UK despite millions being plunged into drastic new lockdown measures this week.
There were an estimated 27,900 new cases reported in England per day in the last week, the Office for National Statistics’ weekly update said today.
However lower rates are dying with the virus compared to earlier in lockdown, according to official figures.
The numbers dying from Covid-19 in UK hospitals has halved since the start of the pandemic, data from the Health Service Journal suggests.
It reports since the start of September, fewer than 15% of people admitted to hospital with the virus have died.
By contrast, around 30 per cent of people admitted to hospitals with the virus were dying during the Spring peak at the height of lockdown.
The figures also suggested people were dying at dramatically lower rates in intensive care.
Around 39.3% were dying after being admitted to ICU with the virus in the lockdown period up to August 31 – and that has fallen to 11.6% since.
