Menu

Preston and South Ribble latest infection rates, Indian mutation found in Lancashire and Health secretary gives update

Posted on - 19th April, 2021 - 8:45pm | Author - | Posted in - Fylde News, Health, Politics, Preston News, Ribble Valley News, South Ribble News, Wyre News
Enjoying the sunshine on the Flag Market on Preston city centre Pic: Tony Worrall
Enjoying the sunshine on the Flag Market on Preston city centre Pic: Tony Worrall

Preston’s coronavirus infection rate has continued to fall further as we begin the second week under the new looser lockdown restrictions.

Advertisement

Concerns have been raised after a number of cases of the Indian Covid mutation have been discovered in Lancashire.

Advertisements
Preston Weekender advert

Preston’s new cases of coronavirus for Monday (19 April) were recorded as seven.

South Ribble saw four new cases for the same day.

See the latest coronavirus cases and information near you

Advertisements

Wyre was up by three cases, Fylde saw no new cases, Ribble Valley up by two and Chorley recorded seven Covid cases.

Preston’s infection rate for Covid is now 31.4 cases per 100,000 people for the seven days to April 15, down from 41.9 cases per 100,000 people for the seven days to April 8.

South Ribble is matching the city, down to 31.6 from 42.4 for the same two date periods.

Chorley dropped to 36.4, down from 45.7 and Wyre was up to 17, from 10.7.

Fylde is at a rate of 21, up from 18.6 and Ribble Valley is down to 13.1 from 23.

Advertisements
barton manor gym

Read more: Pop-up blood donation clinic opens in Preston for Covid study

New variant is confirmed in Lancashire

As 103 cases of the new Indian Covid variant were confirmed in England, three are in Lancashire.

Health secretary Matt Hancock gave an update in the House of Commons as the government moved to ban travel to and from India.

The Prime Minister Boris Johnson cancelled a planned trip to India – with the travel ban on India, moving to the ‘red list’ of countries with restricted travel due to Covid concerns – starting from 4am on Friday.

Anyone returning after this time will be forced to quarantine.

The Lancashire Resilience Forum confirmed to LancsLive the three cases were found in Blackburn with Darwen, Blackpool and one other unknown Lancashire location.

Mr Hancock told MPs: “We’ve recently seen a new variant first identified in India. We’ve now detected 103 cases of this variant, of which again the vast majority have links to international travel and have been picked up by our testing at the border.”

Mr Hancock said the samples have been analysed to see if the new variant has any “concerning characteristics” such as greater transmissibility or resistance to treatments and vaccines.

He added: “After studying the data, and on a precautionary basis, we’ve made the difficult but vital decision to add India to the red list.”

The Prime Minister had been due to travel to India on Sunday on a trip which had already been dramatically scaled back due to the pandemic.

Advertisements
caritas fostering advert

Mr Johnson and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi agreed the cancellation of the trip as New Delhi entered a week-long lockdown to tackle a surge in cases and prevent a collapse of the capital’s health system, as India reported 273,810 new infections – the highest daily rise since the pandemic began.

The Prime Minister said: “I do think it’s only sensible to postpone, given what’s happened in India, the shape of the pandemic there.”

The Department for Transport said the situation in India “has deteriorated with an extremely rapid rise in cases detected throughout April, which is accelerating”.

It added that despite current travel measures, “there is a high volume of travel between India and the UK”.

The Health Secretary highlighted the success of the vaccine rollout – with 10 million people now having received two doses – and falling hospital admissions and deaths.

See the latest coronavirus vaccine stats and information near you

But he told the Commons: “The biggest risk to our progress here in the UK is a new variant that the vaccine does not work as well.”

Read more: See the latest Preston news and headlines

Share
Advertisements
caritas fostering advert
Preston in pictures Preston Bus 207 PO56 JDX (Scania N94UB / East Lancs Esteem)24.03.24 - Penwortham [Church of St Mary] 240323JPGDSC_7658 - Bus stationDSC_7676 - Miller ArcadeDSC_7681 - former Post Office, cenotaph and Town HallDSC_7682 - Central Methodist church, Lune StreetDSC_7668 - Fish (aka Box) MarketDSC_7672 - Miller Arcade View more Advertisement Subscribe to the newsletter

Sign up below to receive Blog Preston's email newsletter. It wings its way into inboxes every Sunday and Wednesday rounding up our top stories and more.

Advertisement News by location

Find news by location, select an area of your choice to be kept up to date with the latest goings on.

The Preston Guide

Discover local businesses and services near you.

    Advertisements
Advertisement Categories

Find news by category, select an category of your choice to be kept up to date with the latest goings on.

Blog Preston email updates

Receive our digest of the biggest and best stories every Sunday to your email inbox

We respect your privacy and you can unsubscribe at any time from our emails