The UK Health Ministry has announced the recording of 1,564 new deaths due to COVID-19, marking an unprecedented spike in the number of pandemic victims in the United Kingdom.
New statistics from the UK Health Ministry, reported by Russia Today, revealed that the number of registered COVID-19 infections in the country rose by 47,525 in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 3,211,576 cases. The daily infection rate fluctuated, with 68,053 cases reported on January 8, a record high, dropping to 59,937 on January 9, 54,940 on January 10, 46,169 on January 11, and 45,533 on January 12.
The daily death toll also reached an unprecedented increase, with the Ministry reporting 1,564 new deaths from the disease. This figure had previously peaked at 1,325 on January 8, then declined to 1,035 on January 9, 563 on January 10, and 529 on January 11, before rising to 1,243 on January 12. The total number of pandemic victims in the country now stands at 84,767.
Hospitals across Britain have been warned to prepare for worse conditions when dealing with the new variant of the coronavirus, facing significant pressures like those experienced by healthcare facilities in London and Southeast England. Professor Andrew Goddard, President of the Royal College of Physicians, stated that "the new variant of the virus is more contagious and widespread across the country."
In recent weeks, the UK has seen a rapid increase in COVID-19 infections, making it the fifth country in the world in terms of the number of recorded infections and deaths from the virus.
In addition to lockdown measures, the UK is relying on vaccination campaigns to emerge from the crisis, with approximately 1.5 million people vaccinated so far using the currently available vaccines from Pfizer/BioNTech and the one developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. A third vaccine, Moderna, has also been approved in France and the EU and has received clearance from the UK's drug regulatory agency, but it won't be available until spring, with 17 million doses ordered.
According to government data today, 2.64 million people have received the first dose of the vaccines so far.
