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COVID infection rates in Lincolnshire are “bouncing around all over the place” after Boston and South Holland saw spikes in the past few days.

Boston went from 168.2 coronavirus cases per 100,000 of the population on Friday to 205.2 on Monday this week. This has been due to a “strong uptake of community-wide testing” in the borough, namely the two new rapid testing centres in the town.

South Holland also saw a slight increase from 297.8 to 301 in the past three days, while all other Greater Lincolnshire districts saw a fall in their infection rates.

Tony McGinty, Assistant Director of Public Health at Lincolnshire County Council, said: “There’s all sorts of reasons why the numbers are bouncing around all over the place. We brought a lot of additional testing in the last few weeks.

“We’re just starting to do additional testing for frontline workers as well in line with the government’s plans for those people who can’t walk down and have to carry on going to work.”

He added: “We are of course, still seeing outbreaks cropping up in certain settings, and some of them with quite a lot of numbers of cases in them. So all sorts of things are still making our numbers quite volatile.”

“There’s nothing in particular of concern going on in Boston at the moment, although we had a really strong uptake of community-wide testing in Boston when it started, and we were running positivity rates of asymptomatic of about one and a half or 2% of the total of people being tested. Obviously, that added to the overall numbers for Boston.”

Greater Lincolnshire’s infection rates from Jan 18 to Jan 25. | Data: Gov UK / Table: James Mayer for The Lincolnite

On Monday, January 18, two mass rapid testing sites opened in Boston, one at the Peter Paine Performance Centre on Rosebery Avenue and the other at the Tollfield Campus Haven High on Tollfield Road.

Last Monday, South Holland jumped to the top of the table for highest Greater Lincolnshire infection rate which was put down to 100 cases at two care homes. Now the district is second in the table, with Lincoln at the top spot.

Hays Travel will close three of its eight branches in Lincolnshire, after the COVID lockdown and travel bans have delayed progress for the travel firm.

The company, based in the North East of England, will close 89 of its 535 shops after a review into performance in recent times.

Three Lincolnshire stores will be affected by these closures: Grantham, Spalding and Boston not reopening once their leases expire.

However, branches in Lincoln, Sleaford, Skegness, Grimsby and Stamford will be some of the 83% of Hays stores that will stay open.

A total of 388 staff will be affected by the closures across the country, around 5% of the 7,700 people employed by Hays Travel.

It comes after Hays Travel bought fellow travel firm Thomas Cook in 2019 in an attempt to expand business.

A third national lockdown and subsequent travel ban forced the company to act and make the difficult decision to close branches.

The closures are part of a two-year business plan set out by the company in order to “be ready for the bounce back” from the coronavirus pandemic.

A spokesperson for Hays Travel said the company is doing all it can to protect any staff affected by the closures.

“We are now  discussing a number of options for alternative work for all staff at those stores.

There are other Hays Travel stores near and all customers continue to be looked after by staff working from home via phone, zoom, FaceTime and other means during lockdown.”

Councillors said losing services from Gainsborough’s John Coupland Hospital would be “disastrous” for the district and the town, and one even warned that hospital bosses “can’t be trusted”.

A motion before West Lindsey district councillors on Monday raised fears that consultant-led outpatient services would be withdrawn and called on the authority to write to United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust expressing “extreme concern” over the moves.

ULHT is considering how it delivers “some outpatient services at some peripheral sites,” but said it has not yet decided on the details.

Responding to the motion, council leader Councillor Owen Bierley said he was concerned about the news.

“That is the main NHS hub within our district,” he said.

“We cannot dispute the unprecedent impacts this pandemic is having on our NHS services, however we must seek to protect local services for local people wherever we can, particularly in rural communities like ours where there are often already barriers to accessing services.”

Councillor Trevor Young said the district was the “poor relation” when it comes to health and called for leaders to be “strong and forceful”.

“We need to get them around the table, and we need to get some solutions around the future use of John Coupland.

“It’s a fantastic resource, we could improve health and well being across the district.

“We don’t want to let this facility slip. If it does, it’ll be disastrous for the district.”

Councillor Roger Patterson pointed to campaigns to save other hospitals, including Grantham and District, saying “they promise one thing and they fail to deliver all the time”.

“They can’t be trusted, so whatever we get from them we need to, as a council, keep our finger on the pulse and hold them to it,” he said.

West Lindsey’s Full Council supported the motion.

Councillor Angela White, who sits on the health scrutiny committee at Lincolnshire County Council, warned of a difficult time for people in the future waiting for operations due to the impact of COVID-19 on services.

Councillor Michael Devine, meanwhile, warned that the trust was “clearly centralising health facilities” and said people would struggle to find ways of getting to Lincoln.

“The health provision in this town, probably the district as well, is gradually becoming worse.

“We have two doctor surgeries and we’re planning to build hundreds and thousands of houses — how are we going to manage?

“The whole health care in this district is just not good enough, and the people responsible for it, the CCG and the health trust, they need to get their act together and improve it,” he said.

Former WLDC Council leader Councillor Jeff Summers hinted at a groundhog day situation where “things just keep going round don’t they?” He remembered having similar discussions several years ago.

The motion was unanimously supported by the whole council.