Doncaster's Covid-19 infection rate is now the 'lowest since recording started'

The borough’s Covid-19 infection rate is the lowest it has been since records began and is some way off levels which would cause concerns for Doncaster’s public health bosses.
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Officials handling health data at Doncaster Council said the latest reported rate of infected people per 100,000 stands at 3.9 which is the ‘lowest since recording started’.

In comparison to Leicester, which went into a local lockdown, the city had an infection rate of 135 infections per 100,000 at its highest point in June.

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Director of public health at Doncaster Council, Dr Rupert Suckling, told councillors at a recent meeting that any figure above 20 would be cause for concern.

The borough’s Covid-19 infection rate is the lowest it has been since records began. Picture: Chris EtchellsThe borough’s Covid-19 infection rate is the lowest it has been since records began. Picture: Chris Etchells
The borough’s Covid-19 infection rate is the lowest it has been since records began. Picture: Chris Etchells

But public health bosses warned the virus is ‘still very much around’ and urged people to continue washing their hands, wear face coverings in shops and keep to social distancing rules.

As of Sunday, July 26, there have been 2,023 confirmed cases of coronavirus in Doncaster. The data has been available since the start of March.

Since the beginning of May, the number of new confirmed cases has been steadily falling week on week until ‘very very recently’.

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Graphs seen by councillors also show the infections per 100,000 has seen a dramatic drop since the middle of June.

The overall number of infections picked up by the test and trace programme is 549 and just over 900 contacts identified through the scheme.

Within the borough, there are said to be ‘four active incidents’ which are currently ‘being maintained’ and three of these are ‘likely to be closed by the end of the week (Sunday, July 31).

Two of the four incidents are currently being investigated by DMBC public health teams because it isn’t confirmed if they are Covid-19 related or not.

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Data shows that one care home in the borough falls under the ‘incident’ category but this is expected to be closed down by July 31 if there are no further reported cases.

The bed occupancy rate of patients across hospitals in Doncaster and Bassetlaw hospitals currently stands at 14 which is the ‘lowest rate’ since March. No patients are in intensive care.

The last recorded admission to hospital was on Tuesday, July 21. As of the end of July 10, 260 have sadly died from the virus.

Council bosses confirmed that the Office for National Statistics data was slightly behind and Doncaster & Bassetlaw hospital trust reported a Covid-19 death on July 24. But the rate of death in Doncaster is at its lowest point since the outbreak began.

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Figures also show that 18,000 people, six per cent of Doncaster’s population fall into the vulnerable shielding category. August 1, guidance will be relaxed for those in this category.

Laurie Mott, head of public health intelligence at Doncaster Council, said: “In terms of the threshold of infections, the level we were concerned about was 20 per 100,000, we’re quite some way off that at the moment and have not even come close to that figure for at least three weeks.

“In terms of comparison to other places in South Yorkshire, our rate on the whole has been lower than the other three areas and has remained that way for the last couple of weeks.

“There are places in which the rate across the country is now zero but that’s not the case in Doncaster obviously but at the moment it seems to be continuing to fall which is a good thing.”

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Dr Rupert Suckling added: “Incidents are cases where we’ve had a single case but happen to be in workplaces and could possibly snowball.

“Across South Yorkshire, we have a lower threshold for what we would call an incident and that’s the right thing to do so we can track the results better and work with businesses to help them.

“We have a high number of incidents because we don’t want to make it an outbreak.”

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