There's been a big increase in our coronavirus infection rate, the council leader said.

In his latest address to the borough Richmond Council leader Cllr Gareth Roberts said there were three deaths to the virus in the past week.

Richmond's infection rate jumped from 103.5 cases per 100,000 people in the population last week to 248 cases today. You can see exactly how many cases there are where you live on the government's interactive map.

Transcript of council leader's message

These are the Covid-19 statistics for Richmond upon Thames. Over the last seven days the infection rate in the borough stands at 248 cases per 100,000 head of population and this equates to approximately 491 cases identified. This brings the total number of cases identified since March to 3,663.

Unfortunately, over the last seven days, a further three deaths have been identified within the borough and this brings the total number of deaths linked to the virus since February to 168.

Over the last seven days, 4,818 people have been tested and that's yielded a positive return rate on those tests of 9.5%. The discrepancy between the number of people tested, the number of cases identified and the positive return rate is explained by people being tested more than once.

If you've been following these videos you will notice that this week's rate of infection is far higher than last week's rate: 248 cases per 100,000 compared with 103.5 cases last week.

Therefore, it is absolutely vital that the council steps up its response to the virus and that's why we are rolling out the lateral flow tests to those areas of the borough which are giving the greatest concern. They are Heathfield, Hampton North and West Twickenham. We hope to be able to roll out these to other areas of the borough in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, the best that the rest of us can do is keep following the rules with which we have become so familiar which is washing our hands wherever possible, wearing a face mask or covering when in shops, supermarkets or similarly enclosed public spaces and of course when travelling on public transport and maintaining a social distance of at least two metres. And we need to make sure that we're following all of the Tier 3 guidelines with which we are now living.

So please follow the rules, protect yourselves and protect others. Thank you.

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