THE NUMBER of deaths at the Royal Bolton Hospital has jumped by four to 209 since yesterday's figures were revealed.

The deaths are among 116 new deaths announced by Public Health England today, taking the total number of people who have died in hospital after testing positive for Covid-19, to 25,866.

The figures do not include people who died in care homes, the community or in Wales, SCotland or Northern Ireland.

In Bolton, NHS England says two people passed away at the hospital on Sunday with the illness and are among seven people recorded as having succumbed to the virus at the hospital in the last seven days.

However, the figures may not be accurate as there can be delays in recording deaths and so more people may have died.

In separate figures produced by the Office for National Statistics 1,001 people in the borough have now tested positive for the illness.

The rate of infection is 350.8 per 100,000 of population, one of the highest in the country but below neighbouring Bury, where the infection rate is 385 while Sunderland tops the table with 494.6.