FIFTY-one deaths from coronavirus have been confirmed in Gwent by Public Health Wales during the first week of 2021, including seven new fatalities today.

They are among more than 300 to be confirmed across Wales since New Year's Eve, and include 63 more today.

Today's confirmations mean that 727 people have died of coronavirus in Gwent (Aneurin Bevan University Health Board area) since the pandemic began, among 3,801 across Wales, again according to Public Health Wales.

Twenty-two new deaths have been confirmed today in neighbouring Cwm Taf Morgannwg UHB area, along with 13 in the Cardiff & Vale UHB area, 10 in the Swansea Bay UHB area, seven in the Betsi Cadwaladr UHB area (north Wales), and four in the Hywel Dda UHB area (west Wales)

There have been a further 1,718 cases confirmed in Wales today, with 348 of these across Gwent. as follows: Caerphilly, 89; Newport, 82; Torfaen, 73; Blaenau Gwent, 59; Monmouthshire, 45.

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The all-Wales rolling weekly case rate for the week to January 2 was 486.5 per 100,000 population, continuing the upward trend of recent days.

Of Wales's 22 council areas, Bridgend (954.8 per 100,000) continues to have the highest weekly case rate in Wales, followed by Wrexham (871.6).

Newport, with 601.9 per 100,000, has the highest case rate in Gwent and the fifth highest in Wales.

Torfaen (572.6) has the seventh highest rate in Wales; Blaenau Gwent (564) has the eighth highest rate in Wales; Caerphilly (519.7) has the 10th highest rate in Wales; Monmouthshire (343.6) has the seventh lowest rate in Wales.

Test positivity rates remain high in many areas of Wales, with the overall rate for the week to January 2 being 24.3 per cent.

Three areas of Gwent continue to have test positivity rates higher than that all-Wales average - Torfaen (27.7 per cent), Newport (27.3 per cent), and Caerphilly (25.9 per cent). The rate in Bridgend, the highest in Wales, remains above one third (33.7 per cent).

The newly confirmed cases across Wales today are:

Wrexham - 170

Cardiff - 140

Rhondda Cynon Taf - 121

Flintshire - 119

Neath Port Talbot - 100

Caerphilly - 89

Swansea - 89

Newport - 82

Bridgend - 78

Vale of Glamorgan - 78

Carmarthenshire - 74

Torfaen - 73

Blaenau Gwent - 59

Denbighshire - 47

Pembrokeshire - 47

Monmouthshire - 45

Conwy - 42

Merthyr Tydfil - 41

Powys - 37

Ceredigion - 18

Gwynedd - 13

Anglesey - 3

Unknown location - 15

Resident outside Wales - 138

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.