Leeds daily Covid infection rate slightly up again despite drop during lockdown

On Friday January 22, the Covid infection rate in Leeds was published as 287.7 cases per 100,000 people with a positivity rate of 11.9 per cent.

This was a slight rise from a rate of 285.3 cases per 100,000 people just the day before on January 21.

The CEO of Leeds City Council, Tom Riordan, has said that "although the overall trend is still down, we need to keep staying in and keeping our distance".

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He also urged that "this awful virus doesn't let up, so let's keep at it".

The rate on January 21 was a drop from January 20 when the rate was at 291.2 cases per 100,000 people, but Mr Riordan said that despite "good progress" the case rate is still "relatively high" and "pace of reduction is slowing".

He added that while the vaccine roll out is "going well", we "can't drop our guard".

On January 22, Tom Riordan tweeted: "Leeds case rate has edged up a little to 287.7 per 100k and positivity to 11.9%.

"Although the overall trend is still down, we need to keep staying in and keeping our distance.

"This awful virus doesn’t let up, so let’s keep at it."

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This followed his tweet on January 21: "Leeds case rate down further to 285.3 per 100k (from 291.2), which is good progress.

"This is still a relatively high case rate & pace of reduction is slowing though, so we need to continue staying in & keeping our distance.

"Vaccine roll out going well but we can’t drop our guard."

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On January 19, the infection rate in Leeds was recorded as 294.4 cases per 100,000 people which was a more significant drop from 318.4 cases per 100,000 people just the day before on January 18.

On January 19 also, the rate was 11 per cent down from seven days prior with the positivity rate stable at 11.6 per cent.

January 18's case rate was a small increase from 317.2 per 100,000 people on January 17, which was again an increase on the 310 cases per 100,000 people recorded on January 16.

The over 60s rate was also up to 244 cases per 100,000 people on January 17.

The Covid infection rate fell for the first time since the start of the third national lockdown on January 11.

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The slight increase in Leeds case rates comes as Prime Minister Boris Johnson told the nation on Friday that there is “some evidence” the UK variant of coronavirus is associated with “a higher degree of mortality".

Professor Peter Horby, who chairs the Government’s New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (Nervtag) defended the Government’s decision to announce the news about the mortality rates from the new variant, saying: “I think a very important principle is transparency.”

He added: “Scientists are looking at the possibility that there is increased severity… and after a week of looking at the data we came to the conclusion that it was a realistic possibility.

“We need to be transparent about that.

“If we were not telling people about this we would be accused of covering it up.

“What we need to do is get that message out and put it in context so instead of headlines saying 30 per cent increase in risk we need to explain this in terms of the absolute risk we may be seeing and also explain the uncertainties.”