Covid-19 deaths pass another grim milestone in Northamptonshire's hospitals

More than 200 patients have now died after testing positive for Covid-19 at Northamptonshire's two main hospitals.

NHS chiefs today confirmed 17 more victims in the county, making the total to 204 in just 38 days since the first deaths on March 16.

Of those, 11 more victims were recorded at Northampton General Hospital between Monday (April 20) and yesterday (April 22).

That takes the toll at the Cliftonville site to 126 when official data on registrations of deaths was collated at 5pm last night (April 22).

Kettering General Hospital also recorded six more victims — 78 have now died there since the outbreak began last month.

This latest daily jump in fatalities is the biggest in the county in a 24-hour period since April 10 and comes 24 hours after Health Secretary Matt Hancock claimed the pandemic was at its peak in the UK.

Chief Medical Advisor Prof Chris Whitty last night warned social distancing regulations needs to be in place for “really quite a long period of time” to continue combating the spread of Covid-19

He said: “In the long run, the exit from this is going to be one of two things. A vaccine or highly effective drugs so that people stop dying of this disease even if they catch it, or which can prevent this disease in vulnerable people.

“Until we have those – and the probability of having those any time in the next calendar year are incredibly small, and I think we should be realistic about that – we’re going to have to rely on other social measures, which of course are very socially disruptive as everyone is finding at the moment.

“Until that point, that is what we will have to do but it will be the best combination that maximises the outlooks but it’s going to take a long time and I think we need to be aware of that.”

Two more coronavirus-related deaths are known to have occurred in a Stanwick nursing home but are not included in the NHS figures, which only counts those who died in hospitals.

In addition, a third death was reported yesterday of a patient cared for by the Northamptonshire Health Foundation Trust.

The trust operates facilities at Berrywood Hospital in Northampton, Daventry's Danetre Hospital, St Mary's in Kettering and the Corby Community Hospital. But it also provides services outside the county. No location has been given for any of the deaths of NHFT patients.

Across the UK, 18,738 hospitalised patients have died, a rise of 638 on the previous day's number.

The Department of Health said there were now 133,495 recorded cases of the virus in the UK after another 4,451 positive results as at 9am yesterday.

Northamptonshire has seen a total of 945 confirmed cases, 41 more than the day before.

The website http://www.easttracker.co.uk/ compares different health authority regions in the East of England.

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