Map shows Covid hotspots as only nine areas in England see rise in cases

Lincoln in the East Midlands has the highest infection rate, with 649 new cases recorded in the last week.

Covid cases are rising in just 3% of places in England two weeks after most of the remaining lockdown restrictions were lifted.

Lincoln in the East Midlands has the highest infection rate, with 649 new cases recorded in the last week.

Middlesbrough has the second highest, but its rate has nearly halved in seven days, with the equivalent of 573 cases per 100,000 people.

Just 9 of 315 areas in England have seen a rise in cases over the last seven days, while 306 (97%) have seen a fall.

National figures continue to paint a promising picture, with the UK recording 21,952 new cases yesterday.

The seven-day average for infections is down 27% on the week before, while deaths have gone up by 20.2%.

There were 6,326 Covid patients admitted to hospital in the last seven days – a weekly rise of 14.8%.

Health experts have said the figures suggest the UK could be ‘over the edge’ of the third wave.

Jamie Jenkins, former head of health statistics at the ONS, said there is a ‘time-lag effect’ when cases continue to fall.

He said: ‘I think looking at the data, we normally see deaths peaking around 14 days after cases come down, I think we might start being over the hill now when it comes to deaths.’

Mr Jenkins added: ‘But let’s have a bit of caution as we go into the autumn period.’

He said hospital admissions were around 80% lower than what they would have been in the past, and deaths were 90% lower.

He added: ‘The vaccine effect has kicked in as well. If you look at the same number of cases to what we had in the winter, it would have been 800 deaths rather than 65-70.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.