Guidance

Coronavirus cases in the UK: daily updated statistics

The latest number of coronavirus (COVID-19) tests, cases and deaths in the UK.

Published 24 January 2020
Last updated 20 August 2020 — see all updates
From:
Department of Health and Social Care and Public Health England

We are consolidating where we publish COVID-19 testing statistics to make it easier to find the latest data.

This page will be switched off in the coming days and will no longer be updated. The figures provided here will still be available.

Statistics on deaths and COVID-19 cases will continue to be published daily on the COVID-19 dashboard. More detailed information on tests and testing capacity will be published weekly on the COVID-19 dashboard and will also be included in the weekly Test and Trace publication.

Dashboard of coronavirus cases and deaths

The coronavirus dashboard is updated daily. It shows the number of cases and deaths in the UK, broken down by region and local authority area.

You can download the data in csv format.

Number of coronavirus deaths and cases

Deaths

As of 5pm on 19 August, of those tested positive for coronavirus in the UK, 41,403 have died across all settings within 28 days of that test.

Daily Cumulative
Deaths in all settings 6 41,403

On 17 July, the Secretary of State asked Public Health England (PHE) to urgently review the way daily death statistics are currently reported.

A review into the method used to calculate these figures considered a range of scientific evidence to identify the best time limit to apply between date of test and date of death.

The new daily measure provides a UK-wide count of deaths under a consistent methodology for England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales that has been endorsed by an external review.

The measure will be based on a 28-day limit between the date of a positive lab-confirmed test and date of death. Deaths that occur more than 28 days after a positive test will not be included in the headline count.

These figures will also be published on the daily dashboard.

Coronavirus deaths and cases give a sense of the spread of the epidemic. Deaths are counted where a lab-confirmed positive coronavirus test result is reported in any setting. This means that not all deaths reported here are caused by coronavirus. Further information is available in the ‘Notes on deaths figures’ section.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publishes further statistics of deaths with breakdowns. This covers death registrations where coronavirus was mentioned, so will include deaths where a person did not have a lab-confirmed positive result.

Positive cases

As of 9am on 20 August, 322,280 people have tested positive for COVID-19 in the UK (for pillars 1, 2 and 4 ‒ see descriptions below).

Daily Cumulative
Positive cases (pillars 1, 2 and 4) 1,182 322,280

Number of tests

Definition of testing pillars

  • pillar 1: swab (antigen) testing in Public Health England (PHE) labs and NHS hospitals for those with a clinical need and health and care workers
  • pillar 2: swab (antigen) testing for the wider population
  • pillar 3: serology testing to show if people have antibodies from having had coronavirus
  • pillar 4: blood and swab testing for national surveillance supported by PHE, ONS, and research, academic, and scientific partners to learn more about the prevalence and spread of the virus and for other testing research purposes, such as the accuracy and ease of use of home testing

Overall volume of tests

As of 9am on 20 August, there have been 15,177,265 tests processed in total across all 4 pillars in the UK.

Daily Cumulative
All tests processed (pillars 1 to 4) 190,434 15,177,265

The government’s testing strategy sets out a challenge to massively increase testing capacity over a range of areas and for a range of purposes.

‘All tests processed’ counts tests that have remained within the control of the programme (and were counted at the time of when it was processed in labs) and those that have been sent out and subsequently returned to be processed in a lab. This is a useful measure as it shows how many tests we have received results for. The publication of this measure is also in line with the UK Statistics Authority recommendations.

We are no longer providing ‘tests made available’ as a metric. This metric was used as a summary measure of the volume of tests that had been made available, including those that remained within the control of the central programme and those that went outside the control of the central programme when they were sent out.

This was particularly relevant in the initial months of the programme when tests that were sent out were expected to be returned very quickly. As the National Testing Programme has developed, capacity has massively grown, and there are increasingly more ways to access tests. There may also be instances where the National Testing Programme sends kits out that are not used immediately, for example to be held at local sites for when they are needed. We will continue to report on lab capacity, all tests processed in the labs, and tests sent out, as well as develop more metrics as part of the weekly NHS Test and Trace publication.

‘People tested’ figures are published as part of the weekly Test and Trace publication. Many people are retested multiple times for valid reasons, such as regular testing of health and care workers over several months.

The ‘people tested’ measure was initially used to avoid counting one person tested several times in a short space of time. It no longer usefully reflects the volume of tests carried out as, for example, a healthcare worker receiving their second, third or fourth test since the start of the pandemic would not be counted as they have been tested once before. Therefore, the people tested figure will be published on a weekly basis within the NHS Test and Trace statistics rather than daily.

Testing capacity

In early May, the government set out another challenge to increase testing capacity to 200,000 tests per day by the end of May. This target was met on 29 May and continues to be met daily.

Overall lab capacity is important to ensure the programme is able to meet potential demand and deliver large numbers of tests.

At 9am on 16 August, testing capacity was 326,086 in the UK.

Pillar 1 Pillar 2 Pillar 3 Pillar 4 Total
Lab capacity 80,986 124,000 120,000 1,100 326,086

Coronavirus tests are processed in several separate labs. Projected lab capacity is an estimate of each lab’s constrained capacity each day based on the staff, chemical reagents and other resources it has available. These estimates are made locally by the labs themselves.

Further information on the methodology of how capacity is reported is available in the testing methodology.

Antigen tests (pillars 1 and 2) (UK)

These are swab tests targeted at those who are sick and with symptoms. They look for the presence of the virus itself.

All tests in pillar 1 and 2 are counted when they are processed by a lab.

Daily Cumulative
Pillar 1 all tests processed 59,626 5,365,745
Pillar 2 all tests processed 116,290 7,080,850

Positive results are often used as an indicator of the progress of the pandemic. Positive test results are an international standard and are reported to the World Health Organization. However, it is important to look at a wider range of indicators, as the proportion of people testing positive in this section is heavily influenced by the number of tests being done and who is being tested.

PHE’s surveillance report and the ONS coronavirus Infection Survey offer detailed information on the incidence and prevalence of the virus.

Daily Cumulative
Pillar 1 positive cases 111 203,374
Pillar 2 positive cases 1,071 118,906
Total positive cases 1,182 322,280

Results from pillars 1 and 2 will drive the NHS Test and Trace programme and devolved test and trace systems.

Antibody tests (pillar 3) (England)

These tests are designed to identify if a person has antibodies in their system, which means that they have had coronavirus at some point, but they do not test for the presence of the virus itself (as in pillars 1 and 2).

Tests in pillar 3 are counted when they are processed by a lab.

Daily Cumulative
Pillar 3 all tests processed 5,838 1,488,710

This pillar does not report people tested or positive cases because tests are anonymised before being sent to a lab. Positive cases for pillar 3 are different to pillars 1 and 2 so should not be classed together.

Surveillance tests (pillar 4) (UK)

Testing in this pillar is designed to understand the spread of the virus and the reliability of different testing methods.

Tests in pillar 4 are counted when they are processed by a lab.

This includes antigen and antibody testing.

Daily Cumulative
Pillar 4 all tests processed 8,680 1,241,960

It’s a legal requirement that all positive cases are reported to PHE, irrespective of pillar. As such, when pillar 4 research studies (for antigen testing) identify positive cases, PHE is notified and this data flows into the surveillance system. This means that currently all positive cases identified by pillar 4 surveillance studies are captured under pillar 1 or 2.

See the results of the ongoing ONS study, which gives the best estimates of what proportion of the population has the virus now.

Tests sent out

Tests can be administered in different ways: tests taken at a hospital, mobile testing unit, regional testing sites or tests posted out to individuals at home or satellite locations. Irrespective of testing channel, tests get sent back to labs for processing, however, not all tests sent out will be returned to the labs.

Daily Cumulative
Pillar 2 tests sent out 122,938 7,751,583
Pillar 4 tests sent out 46,200 1,086,579

Time series documents

20 August notes

The total number of deaths has been revised since yesterday’s total after changes to the historical data that added 1 confirmed COVID-19 death to the cumulative total, so the cumulative today is 1 higher than if you added the daily deaths to yesterday’s total. This is due to reporting delays.

The total number of pillar 2 tests sent out has been revised since yesterday’s total after changes to the historical data that added 1,262 tests to the pillar 2 cumulative total, so the cumulative today is 1,262 higher than if you added the daily tests to yesterday’s total.

The total number of tests processed has been revised since yesterday’s total after the following changes to the historical data:

  • 30 tests removed from the pillar 1 cumulative total
  • 1,448 tests removed from the pillar 2 cumulative total
  • 175 tests added to the pillar 3 cumulative total

The daily tests processed reported today have been added to this revised total rather than the total reported yesterday, so the cumulative total today is 1,303 lower than if you added the daily tests to yesterday’s total.

Further information:

Correspondence with the Office for Statistics Regulation about testing data

The Chair of the Office for Statistics Regulation wrote to us about presentation of statistics about testing.

Read the letter from the regulator on 11 May

Read our response, published on 27 May

Read the letter from the regulator on 2 June

Read our response, published on 12 June

General notes

Data on UK tests, positive cases and deaths is updated on this page daily at 2pm or shortly after. The figures for test results and for deaths are compiled from different sources. This is why the figures for deaths are reported from an earlier point in time than the figures for test results.

Daily totals reflect actual counts reported for the previous day. Each day there may be corrections to previous reported figures. This means that previously published daily counts will not necessarily sum to the latest cumulative figure. It also means that today’s cumulative count may not match the previous day’s cumulative count plus today’s daily count.

Notes on deaths figures

Deaths measure review

A rapid review into the method used to calculate these figures considered a range of scientific evidence on the options for applying a time limit between the date of a positive lab-confirmed test and date of death.

We want to ensure that the best possible measure is used and that methods are applied consistently across the nations of the UK. The proposed methodology does that and has been subject to a rapid peer review by external academics.

The new daily UK measure on this page provides a UK-wide count of deaths under a consistent methodology for England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, that has been endorsed by an external review. The measure will be based on a 28-day limit between the date of a positive lab-confirmed test and date of death. Deaths that occur more than 28 days after a positive test will not be included in the headline count.

These figures will also be published on the daily dashboard.

Deaths in all settings

From 29 April, figures for deaths included all cases where there is a positive confirmed test for coronavirus. The figures include deaths with lab-confirmed COVID-19 in all settings, not just those in hospital, and this provides us with a single figure on an equivalent basis for the whole of the UK. This measure was updated on 12 August to apply a time limit of 28 days between date of test and date of death.

These UK figures are compiled from validated data provided by each of the four nations of the UK. Figures from Health Protection Scotland, Public Health Wales and the Public Health Agency (Northern Ireland) have always included tested cases outside hospital. Figures for England from 29 April onwards are provided by Public Health England and draw together several different data sources, including data from NHS England and Improvement, to produce this broader measure.

This approach allows us to compile deaths data on a daily basis using up-to-date figures across all settings. The data includes deaths with lab-confirmed COVID-19 reported as at 5pm the previous day. The amount of time between occurrence of death and reporting in these figures may vary slightly and in some cases could be a few days, so figures at 5pm may not include all deaths for that day.

The PHE method draws on data from 3 data sources and individual records of deaths are included in the figures as soon as they are available in any of these 3 sources.

As announced previously, from 1 June we have stopped publishing a separate count of deaths in hospital as our daily count now provides a count of deaths in all settings. Figures for deaths in hospital in England continue to be published by NHS England.

In addition to these figures, ONS publishes weekly counts of deaths in which coronavirus was mentioned on the death certificate. This publication is issued every Tuesday, starting on 31 March 2020. The ONS series includes cases in all settings, and also includes some cases where coronavirus is suspected but no test has taken place. ONS detailed data covers England and Wales only, but from 28 April their publication includes a headline summary of registered deaths in the whole of the UK. Their report each Tuesday covers deaths registered up to 11 days before publication.

Read the joint DHSC and ONS transparency statement about coronavirus deaths figures.

Published 24 January 2020
Last updated 20 August 2020 + show all updates

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  10. Updated daily figures. The way deaths are reported has been reviewed and updated using a measure based on a 28-day limit between the date of a positive lab-confirmed test and date of death. In addition, we are no longer publishing the 'tests made available' and have included an explanation for this.

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  69. Updated daily figures. The 'time series of daily deaths' document will be updated later.

  70. Updated testing capacity figures. Changed the first column heading in the table 'Pillar 4 breakdown of test types' from 'In-person (tests processed)' to 'Tests processed'. This is to clarify that it includes a number of samples tested as well as people tested.

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  95. Notes about testing data sources and methodology have been moved to a new page: 'Coronavirus (COVID-19): testing data methodology'. Figures will be updated later today.

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