FOUR more deaths due to coronavirus have been confirmed in Gwent today, taking the total to 705.

They are among 17 new deaths confirmed across Wales, with the overall number of deaths since the pandemic began now at 3,662, according to Public Health Wales.

A further 2,069 cases have also been confirmed in Wales today, including 399 in Gwent (Aneurin Bevan University Health Board area).

Today's newly comfirmed cases in Gwent are: Newport, 118; Caerphilly, 102; Torfaen, 82; Blaenau Gwent, 55; Monmouthshire, 42.

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Gwent's health board area has the second highest amount of new cases among Wales' seven health boards today, behind only Betsi Cadwaladr UHB (north Wales), which has 428 new cases.

The Wales-wide rolling weekly case rate for the week between Christmas Day and New Year's Eve was 463.1 per 100,000 population.

Newport, with 590.3 per 100,000, is the highest case rate in Gwent and the fourth highest in Wales.

Torfaen (555.5) has the seventh highest rate in Wales; Blaenau Gwent (545.4) has the eighth highest rate in Wales; Caerphilly (513.6) has the 10th highest rate in Wales; Monmouthshire (335.1) has the seventh lowest rate in Wales.

More than a quarter (25.4 per cent) of people tested for coronavirus in Wales in the week to December 31 returned a positive result.

But the rate was higher in Newport (29.1 per cent), Torfaen (28.7 per cent), and Caerphilly (27.4 per cent).

 

Public Health Wales figures include reports of the deaths of hospitalised patients in Welsh hospitals, or care home residents, where Covid-19 has been confirmed with a positive laboratory test and the clinician suspects this was a causative factor in the death.

They do not include people who may have died of Covid-19 but who were not confirmed by laboratory testing, those who died in other settings, or Welsh residents who died outside of Wales, and the true number of Covid-19 deaths will be higher.

The Office for National Statistics - which counts all deaths in which coronavirus is mentioned on the death certificate - puts the number of deaths in Wales much higher.