COVID-19 case rates have fallen in most regions of England in the last week but hospital admissions and mortality rates have continued to rise.

London had the highest rate of new cases in the seven days to 10 January, with 864.9 per 100,000, down from 1,043.9 the previous week, Public Health England (PHE) has said.

The other regions recording a week-on-week fall are the East Midlands, eastern England, northeast England, southeast England and Yorkshire and the Humber.

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Three regions recorded an increase were northwest England, southwest England and the West Midlands.

The new data showed that case rates in England are falling among all age groups except for people aged 80 and over.

The highest rate continues to be among 20 to 29-year-olds, which stood at 879.7 cases per 100,000 people in the seven days to 10 January, down from 936.9.

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The hospital admission rate for COVID-19 was 37.2 per 100,000, compared with 29.5 per 100,000 in the previous week.

Hospital admission rates for COVID-19 have increased in all regions except for the North East. London continues to have the highest with a rate of 58.19.

The government is urging people to adhere to the lockdown restrictions as hospitals continue to struggle with the number of new admissions.

Figures released by NHS England earlier said around one in five major hospital trusts in England had no spare adult critical care beds on 10 January.

Some 9,267 patients also waited between 30 and 60 minutes to be handed over from ambulance teams to A&E staff in the week to 10 January.

But Health Secretary Matt Hancock tweeted that he was “delighted” with the news that three million coronavirus vaccines have now been administered across the UK.

Pharmacies have begun to give out the vaccines in areas across England, with the chief executive of Boots Seb James saying he believed staff in his stores could administer “half a million a week”.

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