New Covid-19 cases in Wigan creep up but rate is region's lowest

However, that means the rate of new cases in the borough is 4.6 per 100,000 residents and this is the lowest in Greater Manchester.

The figure is also considerably smaller than those for the region and the country as a whole, which are 9.6 and 7.1 per 100,000 people respectively.

New cases remain at their lowest level since mid-March, the local authority's latest weekly Covid-19 tracker document says.

Wigan's exceedence rating is currently red, meaning the data may not be following the expected trends, but this can be quite volatile when small numbers of cases are involved and Public Health England (PHE) has told local authorities there is no reason for concern given how low the new infection rate is.

One death with Covid-19 was registered in the borough in the latest week covered by data, down from two the previous week.

All-cause death figures also decreased slightly compared to the previous week.

Overall there have been 2,147 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the borough, a rate of 658 per 100,000 people.

This is higher than the figures for Greater Manchester and the country.

As of July 10 there were 345 registered deaths in Wigan with Covid-19, with 76 per cent of those occurring in hospitals and 21 per cent in care homes. Two per cent of the deaths involving the coronavirus occurred at home.

The borough's all-cause mortality figures are now within the expected range for this time of year, Wigan's public health experts say.

The R number for the North West, which shows if the infection outbreak is getting bigger or smaller, remains virtually unchanged from previous weeks and is between 0.7 and 1.