625 new COVID cases on Wednesday in Lincolnshire as PM defends lockdown easing

There have been 625 cases of coronavirus confirmed in Greater Lincolnshire on Wednesday — the highest daily count since November.

The government’s COVID-19 dashboard on Wednesday reported 318 new cases in Lincolnshire, 242 in North East Lincolnshire and 65 in North Lincolnshire.

The figure is 82% higher than last Wednesday’ 343 cases and is the highest case numbers confirmed on one day since November 19, 2020.

In positive news, the figures showed no further deaths in the government or NHS England data today.

Nationally, cases increased by 32,548 to 4,990,916 while deaths rose by 33 to 128,301. It is the first time the UK’s daily COVID infections have passed 32,000 since January.

In national news today, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been defending his plan to lift the majority of COVID rules from July 19.

Lincolnshire’s coronavirus cases up to July 7.

During Prime Minister’s Questions, Labour leader Kier Starmer said it was reckless to remove all protections in one go and called for Mr Johnson to ensure masks still had to be worn on public transport.

He warned of a major increase in cases and questioned comments from health secretary Sajid Javid that cases could reach 100,000 per day.

However, Mr Johnson said the easing was “balanced” and said the link between infection and serious disease and death had been “severed” by the vaccine programme.

He did not reveal how many cases he thought would be confirmed before August 16 – when double jabbed people whould no longer have to self-isolate.

The BBC, however, has estimated 4.5million could be asked to self-isolate this summer.

Mr Johnson was set to appear before the government’s liaison committee at 3.30pm where he was facing being grilled for a further number of hours on COVID among other subjects.

Coronavirus data for Greater Lincolnshire on Wednesday, July 7

66,880 cases (up 625)

• 45,092 in Lincolnshire (up 318)
• 10,463 in North Lincolnshire (up 65)
• 11,325 in North East Lincolnshire (up 242)

2,196 deaths (no change)

• 1,622 from Lincolnshire (no change)
• 302 from North Lincolnshire (no change)
• 272 from North East Lincolnshire (no change)

of which 1,314 hospital deaths (no change)

• 816 at United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust (no change)
• 43 at Lincolnshire Community Health Service hospitals (no change)
• 1 at Lincolnshire Partnership Foundation Trust (no change)
• 454 in Northern Lincolnshire (NLAG) (no change)

4,990,916 UK cases, 128,301 deaths

DATA SOURCE — FIGURES CORRECT AT THE TIME OF THE LATEST UPDATE. POSTCODE DATA INCLUDES DEATHS NOT IN HEALTHCARE FACILITIES OR IN HOSPITALS OUTSIDE AUTHORITY BOUNDARIES.