The death toll from the novel coronavirus in the United Kingdom, has overtaken that of Italy, to be the highest official death toll in Europe as at Tuesday 5th May 2020.
According to the report obtained from Reuters, the weekly figures from Britain’s Office for National Statistics (ONS) added more than 7,000 deaths in England and Wales, raising the total for the United Kingdom to 32,313 as of late April.
Only the United States has suffered more deaths than Britain, according to the data so far.
UK Evening Standard also reported that the number of people who have died in hospitals across the UK after testing positive for coronavirus increased by 436, according to information received from the NHS.
They include 366 people in England, 44 in Scotland, 26 in Wales, and 17 in Northern Ireland.
The UK’s death toll is now at least 29,186, up from 28,734.
Of the 21,750 confirmed reported deaths so far in hospitals in England of people who tested positive for Covid-19, 11,412 (52%) have been people aged 80 and over while 8,442 (39%) were 60-79.
A further 1,732 (8%) were aged 40-59, with 153 (1%) aged 20-39 and 11 (0.05%) aged 0-19, according to NHS England, the report added.
The death toll as reported was based on death certificate mentions of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, including suspected cases.
While different ways of counting make comparisons with other countries difficult, the figure confirmed Britain was among those hit worst by a pandemic that has killed more than 250,000 worldwide.
“The UK has been hit very hard in this wave of COVID-19 and each death will (have) brought sadness to families,” said Professor James Naismith of Oxford University, who is director of the Rosalind Franklin Institute of medical research.
Opposition politicians said the death toll figures proved the government was too slow to provide enough protective equipment to hospitals and introduce mass testing.
“I’d be amazed if when we look back, we don’t think: yep we could have done something differently there,” the government’s chief scientific adviser, Patrick Vallance, said in response to lawmakers’ questions on testing.
Britain’s health ministry said the ONS data should be handled with care.
“We caution against extrapolating or estimating figures based on historic data as it risks being extremely misleading,” it said on Twitter.
But early evidence for excess mortality suggests Britain will be one of the hardest-hit on this measure, too.
ONS statistician Nick Stripe said excess deaths for the United Kingdom were running about 42,000 higher than average at this point in the year.
Only about 80% of these excess deaths have been linked specifically with COVID-19, however.
The weekly ONS data also showed the peak in COVID-19 deaths has likely passed, although the week to April 24 was still the second-deadliest since comparable records began in 1993.
The overall decline also masked a worsening picture in care homes.
The ONS said 7,911 deaths from all causes were registered in care homes in the week ending April 24, three times higher than a month previously.
“These figures show that talk of being ‘past the peak’ of this awful virus simply does not hold true for social care,” said Labour opposition lawmaker Liz Kendall.