Sheffield escalated to 'area of enhanced support' following sharp rise in Covid-19 cases

The city has been moved up to an ‘area of enhanced support’ on the national coronavirus watch list which aims to monitor areas with rising numbers of new virus cases, before imposing restrictions.

This means the Government will now get more involved with helping Sheffield test more people by supplying more mobile testing sites and carrying out in depth work with high risk groups and sectors, to slow the spread of the virus.

National experts will also be available to provide special knowledge of how coronavirus spreads across areas in an attempt to combat the rising number of positive tests.

Rotherham, which has recorded a spiking number of Covid-19 cases, has also been added to an area of concern on the official list.

It comes after Sheffield recorded its highest number of coronavirus cases in one singular day, since the pandemic hit with 159 people testing positive for coronavirus on Wednesday, September 30 according to the latest government statistics.

The previous highest figure for the most new cases in a 24 hour period, was when 110 were confirmed to have contracted the virus on March 31 when testing was largely restricted to hospital settings at the height of the crisis.

There have now been 6,259 confirmed positive cases in the city and there 95 cases per 100,000 people in the seven days up to September 27 – while England had an average of 28.

Sheffield City Council also verified that the city had reached ‘red level’ following a sustained rise in cases over the last 21 days, with positive cases are now being found across the whole region, whereas it had previously been confined to specific areas and postcodes.

The city is now recording an average of 78 positive cases per day based on the previous 7 days, which indicates that the ‘R’ number is above 1 in virus cases will continue to increase quickly across Sheffield.

The local authority said: “Cases are mainly prevalent in younger people and it has remained at this level for the last few weeks, although we are starting to see increased cases in older people.”

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