London Daily

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Tuesday, Oct 20, 2026

UK records 678 further coronavirus deaths and 13,494 new infections

The daily death toll is a 25.9 per cent drop on last week's figures
T

he UK has recorded a further 678 deaths of coronavirus on Thursday, bringing the total UK death toll to 115,529.

Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies for deaths where Covid-19 has been mentioned on the death certificate, together with additional data on deaths that have occurred in recent days, show there have now been 134,000 deaths involving Covid-19 in the UK.

The daily rise is a 25.9 per cent drop from last week’s figure of 915. New Covid-19 cases also dropped (34.6 per cent) from last Thursday’s rise of 20,634.

Public Health England (PHE) said on Thursday a further 13,494 people had tested positive for the virus. It brings the total number of cases in the UK to 3,998,655.

Thursday’s update to the Covid-19 dashboard was delayed due to technical difficulties, said PHE, but that a total of 13,509,108 people had now received the first dose of a vaccine.

It comes after Boris Johnson urged all eligible adults to come forward for a coronavirus vaccine.

He told a Downing Street news conference that there were still nearly two million people who needed to be vaccinated before the Government could reach its February 15 target.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Thursday that the rollout of coronavirus vaccines is “absolutely essential” for summer holidays to take place.

He said because take-up of the vaccine was so high, “that will all help us get out of this and help us get back to normal”.

Scotland recorded 48 deaths from coronavirus and 830 positive tests in the past 24 hours, Nicola Sturgeon said.

It brings the death toll under this measure – of people who first tested positive for the virus within the previous 28 days – to 6,599.

Speaking during the Scottish Government’s daily briefing, Ms Sturgeon said 189,175 people have now tested positive in Scotland, up from 188,345 the previous day.

Meanwhile a further nine people have died with Covid-19 in Northern Ireland.

Another 253 positive cases of the virus were also reported by the Department of Health on Thursday.

There are 518 Covid-positive patients in hospital, with 58 in ICU.

There have been a further 410 cases of coronavirus in Wales, taking the total number of confirmed cases to 197,754.

Public Health Wales reported another 27 deaths, taking the total in the country since the start of the pandemic to 5,059.
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