The UK has now carried out 501,379 tests for coronavirus, with 19,316 tests carried out yesterday.
124,743 people have tested positive for the virus, 17,971 people are in hospital with coronavirus in the UK and sadly 16,509 who were in hospital with coronavirus have died.
The UK government has promised it will dramatically increase coronavirus testing capacity to 100,000 a day by the end of the month.
This comes as the UK has confirmed daily deaths rate has fallen to 449, the lowest reported since the 6th April.
Fall in hospital patients in London a relief
The deputy chief scientific adviser Angela Maclean has been talking through key statistical data in a series of slides.
She says the public has “responded” to the government’s call for social distancing, with overall travel 80% of what it was in February and rail and Tube journeys down by 95% since February.
While there was a rise in road, rail and bus trips over the Easter weekend, travel patterns quickly returned to pre-Easter lockdown levels afterwards and have been maintained since then.
She moves on to talk about trends in new infections. Monday’s figure of 4,676 was the lowest for four days and some way below the peak so far, on 5 April.
She says the figures are “flattening out” and are stable – which she describes as a “relief”.
On hospital admissions, she says the number of people in hospital who have tested positive “remains stable”. While well ahead of the rest of the country, the number of patients in London has fallen for seven consecutive days and she hopes that this will be “replicated” across the UK.
She finishes by talking about the number of deaths in the UK compared with other countries, acknowledging there is a lag for stats of fatalities in hospitals and those in “all settings”, including care homes.
