Almost 40 million people live in areas of England which are practically free of coronavirus, Government data has revealed.

The success of the vaccine rollout alongside the continuation of lockdown restrictions has seen infection rates fall.

And now seven in 10 people in England live in places where two or fewer cases of Covid-19 were recorded in the last week.

England is split into 6,800 smaller local areas – which each have average population of approximately 8,200 people – to record accurate data about the virus.

Public Health England, which records the infection figures, redacts data for places which have two, one or zero cases in one week so those infected cannot be identified.

And analysis by The Times showed a total of 4,819 local areas have had their information removed.

This means 38 million people are living in areas where two or fewer cases have been recorded in the most recent week of available data.

Dr Mike Tildesley, from the University of Warwick team which correctly predicted the UK’s second wave of the virus, said ‘things are very much moving in the right direction’.

The infectious disease modeller, who is also a member of the SPI-M group whose calculations feed into SAGE, added: ‘The road map for relaxation is on track but we need to ensure we monitor it at every stage as the country reopens to evaluate the impact of unlocking society upon cases, hospital admissions and deaths.

‘The vaccination campaign continues to be successful, so I hope that the road map can proceed on schedule.

‘But it is really important we monitor the data over the next few weeks.’ 

It comes after it was reported yesterday that another 17 people have died with coronavirus, while 2,685 cases were reported across the UK.

The daily deaths figure has halved in a week, with 33 recorded one week previously, and the R rate remains below 1.0, showing the pandemic is shrinking.

The positive signs have sparked hope that the next stage of unlocking England will go ahead as planned on the date of May 17.

The Daily Express reported yesterday that Boris Johnson will give an ‘ambitious’ speech on May 11 which will ‘chart the way forward for a country coming out of Covid’.

It will ‘demonstrate how we will build back better from the pandemic and fulfil our pledge to unite and level up the country’, the prime minister said.

He added it will ‘Bounce Back Britain’ in the coming weeks and months.  

If the date goes ahead as scheduled, May 17 will allow up to six people to gather indoors, including in bars and restaurants, and could mark the restarting of non-essential foreign travel.

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