UK Records 534 Daily Covid Deaths In Week Government Says 'We've Won The War'

The UK has recorded 534 daily Covid-19 deaths, the highest figure since February last year.

It comes as statisticians suggested Covid-19 infections have stopped falling, and a week after Plan B restrictions were abandoned and ministers said the Omicron-fuelled surge was “in retreat”.

The government said on Wednesday a further 534 people have died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19, bringing the total to 157,409.

These figures now include deaths in England following possible reinfections of Covid-19, which is why there has been a jump in the cumulative total of deaths and why the daily total is higher than recently.

But the daily figure is the highest since February 23, 2021, when the daily count was 548. The new data will raise questions over the rolling back of measures to curb the spread of Covid-19.

On Monday, culture secretary Nadine Dorries, when doing a media round defending Boris Johnson, said: “We have won the war on Covid in this country. That’s what people see and that’s what people know.” 

There were 88,085 cases of Covid-19 reported in the UK on Wednesday.

Earlier in the day the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said Covid-19 infections have plateaued or showed an increase.

In England around one in 20 people in private households are estimated to have had the virus in the week to January 29, or 2.6 million people – unchanged from the week to January 22.

In Wales around one in 20 people had Covid-19 last week, up from one in 30.

Northern Ireland has also seen a week-on-week increase, from one in 20 people to one in 15.

In Scotland, the ONS describes the trend as “uncertain” with around one in 30 people estimated to have had Covid-19 last week, unchanged from the previous week.