Fatality figures are expected to continue to rise for at least two more weeks

The number of people with coronavirus who have died in UK hospitals has topped 10,000.

The total number of hospital deaths stood at 10,612 on Sunday, up by 737 from 9,875 the day before.

For the last two days, more than 900 deaths have been recorded in hospitals in the UK’s official death toll.

On Saturday, the government said 917 people had died in hospitals over the previous 24 hours, while on Friday the equivalent number for the previous day was 980 – the highest so far.

France is the only country in Europe to have exceeded 980 deaths in day. But unlike the UK, France includes care home deaths in its figures. France, Spain and Italy have all recorded more total deaths than the UK’s tally for hospital deaths but those countries appear to be past the peak of the outbreak, while the UK’s figures are expected to continue to rise for at least two more weeks.

Concerns were growing on Sunday the UK will end up with the highest number of Covid-19 deaths of any European country.

Before the four countries released their figures, Sir Jeremy Farrar, the director of the Wellcome Trust, and a member of the Sage committee, which advises the government on the pandemic, told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show: “The numbers in the UK have continued to go up. I do hope we’re coming close to the number of new infections reducing … and the number of deaths plateauing and starting to come down.

“And yes, the UK is likely to be certainly one of the worst, if not the worst affected country in Europe.”

Prof Sylvia Richardson, president-elect of the Royal Statistical Society and co-chair of the Royal Statistical Society taskforce on Covid-19, said: “Countries like South Korea and Germany, which are able to pursue testing of acute Covid-19 infections followed by isolation on a massive scale, the universally agreed first line policy for controlling an epidemic, have experienced better trajectories so far.

“This was the initial strategy followed by PHE in the UK but was not sustained as we did not have the testing capacity at that time. Ramping up testing capacity as outlined by the government is key to being able to restore such a strategy.”

The new deaths of patients in England, announced on Sunday, were of people aged between 26 and 100 years old, and 42 (aged between 30 and 98) had no known underlying health condition.

NHS England said 121 deaths occurred on 11 April, while 531 took place between 1 April and 10 April. The remaining five deaths occurred in March, with the earliest new death taking place on 26 March.



