Havering's Covid-19 death rate up a third in a week

The figures were released as government began publishing for the first time a “heatmap” showing how coronavirus is affecting different age groups in the borough.

According to the data, throughout November the virus has been infecting increasing numbers of people in their 80s and 90s, who are most at risk of serious or fatal illness.

Last week, the Romford Recorder reported that in the week from November 21 to November 27, there were 20 Covid-19 deaths registered in Havering – accounting for 40 per cent of all deaths in the borough that week.

Data published yesterday for the following week – November 28 to December 4 – showed 27 Covid-19 deaths registered in Havering, accounting for 49pc of all deaths in the borough that week.

In the most recent figures, the proportion of deaths occurring outside hospital settings almost doubled.

Between November 21 and 27, 18 out of 20 Covid-19 deaths occurred in hospital. One occurred in a hospice and the other in the person’s own home.

But between November 28 and December 4, there were two deaths in hospices, one at the person’s own home – and two in care homes.

By the end of that week, December 4, Havering’s Covid-19 infection rate was 364.5 cases per 100,000 people.

Since then, it has been rising sharply.

On December 6, it surpassed the 400 mark for the first time since the pandemic began, hitting 401.8 cases.

By December 11, the most recent day of verified data, it had hit 596 cases per 100,000 – a 48pc increase in five days.

By that day, Havering had so many Covid-19 cases in people aged in their late 80s and 90s that it had been put into the most severe category on the government heatmap.

The most recent figures for the borough’s hospital trust – the Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust – end on December 8.

They showed 238 hospital beds occupied by Covid-19 patients – up 10.7pc on the week before.