POSTAL services in Widnes have been affected by a coronavirus outbreak among staff.

The Royal Mail has named the town on a list of 28 areas where delivery has been limited as a result of the spread of Covid-19 among the workforce.

These places are no longer receiving regular post because of the high numbers of workers who are off sick or self-isolating.

In a statement, the Royal Mail said: "The combination of greatly increased uptake of online shopping and the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions mean that all delivery companies are experiencing exceptionally high volumes.

"Every single parcel and letter is important to us.

“Despite our best efforts and significant investment in extra resources, some customers may experience slightly longer delivery timescales than our usual service standards.

"This is due to the exceptionally high volumes we are seeing, exacerbated by the coronavirus-related measures we have put in place in local mail centres and delivery offices to keep our people and customers safe.

“In such cases, we always work hard to get back to providing our usual level of service as quickly as we can."

Residents in some affected have not had mail for more than a month, leading to fears that the elderly will not receive postal notifications of when a vaccine is available to them.

This has prompted calls from MPs and the Communication Workers Union for postal workers to be added to the priority list for vaccinations.