Weekly registered coronavirus deaths pass 2,000 for first time since May – ONS

There were 2,466 deaths involving Covid-19 registered in the week ending November 13 in England and Wales, the Office for National Statistics said (ONS).

This is the highest number since the week ending May 22, when 2,589 deaths were registered, and a rise of 529 deaths (27%) from the previous week (ending November 6).

The Covid-19 deaths, which rose for the tenth consecutive week, made up a fifth of the overall deaths in England and Wales in the week ending November 13.

Nuffield Trust deputy director of research Sarah Scobie said the figures are a “sobering reminder of the dreadful impact of this virus”.

She said: “This growing number will be piling on the pressure for NHS staff. For some hospitals, particularly in Covid hotspot areas, it will feel as if they are in the depths of winter already.

“This pressure on services has implications both on the wellbeing of exhausted staff and the ability to work through the growing waiting list of patients for routine operations and care.”

Prof Kevin McConway, Emeritus Professor of Applied Statistics at the Open University, said a positive is that the week-on-week rise in deaths involving Covid-19 is becoming smaller.

He said: “Deaths are still rising, but a bit more slowly than they were. I’d be happier if the rise had been even smaller, and delighted if the numbers of deaths had started to go down, and they haven’t – but death registrations lag well behind numbers of new infections, so I wouldn’t really have expected a fall yet.”

The overall number of deaths in hospitals, private homes and care homes was above the five-year average – the expected number of deaths for this time of year.

When looking at deaths by the date they occurred, there were 306 deaths involving coronavirus in hospitals on November 9. This is the highest number of daily deaths since May 6, when 309 hospital deaths took place.

All English regions, and Wales, saw a higher number of registered deaths than the five-year average.

North-west England had 615 deaths involving Covid-19 registered in the week ending November 13 – the highest number for the region since the week ending May 15, according to the ONS.

In Yorkshire and the Humber, 450 Covid-19 deaths were registered in the week to November 13 – again, the highest for the region since the week to May 15.

Some 284 Covid-19 deaths were registered in the West Midlands – the highest since the week to May 22 – while 245 were registered in the East Midlands, the highest since the week to May 15.

Weekly registered deaths not involving Covid-19 were below the five-year average for the third consecutive week, the ONS said.

A total of 68,524 deaths have so far been registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate, according to the latest reports from the UK’s statistics agencies.

This includes 62,162 deaths in England and Wales up to November 13 (and registered up to November 21), which were confirmed by the ONS on Tuesday.

Since these statistics were compiled, a further 2,432 deaths are known to have occurred in England, plus 80 in Scotland, 128 in Wales and 91 in Northern Ireland, according to additional data published on the Government’s coronavirus dashboard.

Together, these totals mean that so far 71,255 deaths involving Covid-19 have taken place in the UK.

These are deaths where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate, including suspected cases.

Of all deaths involving coronavirus in England and Wales, around two thirds occurred in hospital, (40,062 deaths), the figures show.

The remainder occurred in care homes (16,849 deaths), private homes (2,927 deaths), hospices (833 deaths), other communal establishments (242 deaths) and elsewhere (223 deaths).

More than 30,000 excess deaths not linked to Covid-19 have occurred in private homes since the start of the pandemic.

There were 30,785 non-Covid excess deaths in homes in England and Wales registered between March 7 and November 13, the ONS said.