Nottingham hospital trust warns of Covid surge as city considers tighter restrictions

A Nottingham hospital trust has warned that the surge in coronavirus patients coming into hospital is as bad as April, as the city looks set to go into England’s highest risk Tier 3 lockdown next week.

Many non-urgent operations have already been postponed, while latest figures show Nottingham now has the fifth highest infection rate in England.

The UK’s R number, showing the rate of transmission, has decreased slightly since last week. It is now estimated to be between 1.2 and 1.4.

Across the country, another 20,530 new cases were confirmed in the last 24 hours and there have been a further 224 deaths, taking the total number of deaths to 44,571.