260 further coronavirus cases and one more death recorded in Mid Ulster

A Coronavirus testing centre in Dalston, east London. There were a further 6,042 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK as of 9am on Saturday, taking the overall number to 429,277. A further 34 deaths were recorded.

The number of coronavirus cases in Mid Ulster increased by 260 in the last 24 hours, official figures show – and one more death was recorded.

A total of 48,543 cases had been confirmed in Mid Ulster when the UK coronavirus daily dashboard was updated on February 8 (Tuesday), up from 48,283 on Monday.

The rate of infection in Mid Ulster now stands at 32,590 cases per 100,000 people, far higher than the Northern Ireland average of 30,242.

Since January 31, the UK Health Security Agency has changed the way it reports coronavirus cases.

It means if one person tests positive for the virus more than 90 days after the first infection, two infection episodes will be recorded.

Across the UK, the number of recorded cases increased by 66,171 over the period, to 17,932,803.

People with a positive lateral flow test no longer need to take a follow-up PCR test to confirm the result unless they have coronavirus symptoms.

UK case numbers currently only include LFT results for England and Northern Ireland, with lateral flow testing data for Scotland due to be added in the coming weeks.

There was also one more coronavirus death recorded in the latest 24-hour period in Mid Ulster.

The dashboard shows 292 people had died in the area by February 8 (Tuesday) – up from 291 on Monday.

It means there have been two deaths in the past week, which is a decrease on four the previous week.

They were among 3,136 deaths recorded across Northern Ireland.

The figures include anyone who died within 28 days of a positive test result for Covid-19, and whose usual residence was in Mid Ulster.

Daily death counts are revised each day, with each case backdated to the actual date of death.