New Hope As 30% Of Hospitals Record No Deaths In 48 Hours

The impact of the virus is decreasing, experts said yesterday, with one in three hospitals not recording a death in the last 48 hours.

- Sarah O’Grady

And it has been a fortnight since London recorded more than 100 cases in a single day.

Professor Carl Heneghan, a University of Oxford epidemiologist who has been tracking the outbreak data closely, said 30 per cent of NHS hospitals have not recorded a single fatality in the past two days.

He said all signs point to the coronavirus “disappearing at a rate that’s speeding up, which is highly reassuring”.

And Professor Chris Whitty, England’s chief medical officer, said the total number of deaths from all causes in England, not just virus related, was now down to the rate in an average winter.

Another figure showed six major London hospitals have reported no coronavirus deaths in 48 hours.

Once the centre of the pandemic, fewer than 100 people have been diagnosed with Covid-19 daily in the capital since May 7, when there were 149 new cases.

More than 1,000 cases were diagnosed each day in London at the pandemic’s peak.

In comparison, on May 15 – the latest date for reliable data – just 52 people were found to have the disease, despite a huge increase in testing over the past month.