Record pandemic infections as East of England has highest Covid cases in England
The latest coronavirus survey estimates more than half a million people are infected with Covid-19 in the East of England - representing one in 12 of the population.
The figure is the highest number since the intensive study started in May 2020 in the early stages of the pandemic.
The figures are revealed in the latest weekly survey by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) which tests a representative sample of the population to gauge the spread of the disease.
It was estimated by the ONS that 525,000 people in the East of England had coronavirus on 19 March 2022, which was nearly 9% of the population of the region. It was the highest figure in England with the estimate at one in 17 for the East Midlands and one in 13 for the South East.
The steep rise in infections across much of the country is being driven by the Omicron BA.2 variant, a more transmissible form of Omicron, the ONS said.
The figures are further evidence that Covid-19 is becoming rapidly more prevalent in the UK and come as the number of people in hospital with the virus continues to increase.
There were nearly 1,600 patients in hospital with coronavirus in the East of England this week, which is the highest number for more than a year. But fewer people are becoming seriously ill and needing to be put on ventilators to help them breathe.
The number of people dying with Covid-19 recorded on their death certificate is much lower that it was in earlier stages of the pandemic.
In the first nine weeks of 2022 there were 1,170 coronavirus-related deaths in the ITV News Anglia region compared to 7,700 in the same period in 2021.
The ONS survey data supplements the daily testing figures issued by the government on its coronavirus dashboard. The number of positive tests for Covid-19 recorded in the Anglia region on Monday, 21 March was more than 12,400 - the highest daily figure since January.
The number of positive tests puts the coronavirus infection rate at nearly 970 per 100,000 people in the ITV Anglia region. That number peaked at more than 1,240 in January 2022 once the original Omicron variant became established.
The R rate - which measures how fast an infection is spreading - is estimated to be between 1.1 and 1.4 in the East of England. That means that every 10 people with Covid are currently infecting between 11 and 14 more and the pandemic is increasing.
The ONS infection survey is considered the most reliable measure of the prevalence of Covid-19 in the UK because it does not rely on people showing symptoms or coming forward to be tested.