Eight patients have died from coronavirus in Wigan

As the virus sweeps the nation and world, NHS England is keeping a running total of cases and fatalities, both UK-wide and locally.

And the figures show that the borough's first three deaths all happened on Sunday. Another fatality came on Tuesday and four further patients lost their lives on Wednesday.

Among those was a 73-year-old man who crashed into nurse Lucy Duncan's car as she drove home from work last week and to whom she tended for hours while paramedics arrived and after he was taken to hospital.

So far there have been 91 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the borough but as there is so little testing going on at present and most people feeling ill are advised to self-isolate and not seek medical attention unless their condition deteriorates, it is assumed that the real infection rate is far higher.

The national figure for cases currently stands at 33,718 case of which 2,921 have, sadly, proved fatal.

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