Coronavirus death toll in Borders up to seven as number of cases confirmed here jumps from 63 to 77

The increase of 14 positive test results announced today, March 31, is the second biggest daily rise seen here yet and just one short of the largest, reported the day before yesterday.

It takes the tally of diagnoses of the disease in the region from 63 to 77.

The latest daily update issued by the Scottish Government also reveals that 1,993 cases of the illness, also known as Covid-19, have been confirmed nationwide, up from 1,563 yesterday.

Across the UK, 22,141 people have tested positive for the illness, including UK Government prime minister Boris Johnson, health secretary Matt Hancock and chief medical officer Chris Whitty, plus the Prince of Wales.

That’s up from 19,522 the day before.

The death toll claimed by coronavirus in Scotland now stands at 60, up 13 overnight, including seven in the Borders.

The number of fatalities it has claimed UK-wide is up to 1,408, having risen from 1,228.

Some 15,895 tests for the illness have now been carried out in Scotland, with 13,902 giving negative results.

It’s almost three weeks now since the first two cases of the illness were confirmed in the Borders on Wednesday, March 11, and approaching a month since Scotland’s first case was announced on Sunday, March 1, after spreading worldwide from China.

That figure went up to three on Friday, March 13; five on Saturday, March 14; seven on Sunday, March 15; eight the following Thursday, March 19; nine on Friday, March 20; 10 on Saturday, March 21; 11 on Sunday, March 22; 12 on Monday, March 23; 15 last Wednesday; 23 last Thursday; 28 last Friday; 35 on Saturday; 50 on Sunday; and 63 yesterday.

Though rising rapidly, the number of cases of Covid-19 in the Borders is still well behind those reported in the neighbouring health board areas of Dumfries and Galloway, Lanarkshire and Lothian, up to 92, 244 and 269 respectively.

The near-2,000 Scots confirmed to have coronavirus are likely to be only a small fraction of the number actually infected, however, according to the country’s chief medical officer, Catherine Calderwood.

Dr Calderwood told a briefing in Edinburgh yesterday that she reckons the number of people in Scotland infected with the disease to be more than 100,000, and that estimate that only one in 64 cases of coronavirus here has been detected would, if correct, put the likely figure for the Borders at almost 5,000 out of a population of about 115,000.

She added at another briefing today that the proportion of tests giving positive results for coronavirus is “increasing day by day”, warning: “Despite what we are doing, the virus is still being transmitted in our communities.”

Currently 28 patients confirmed to have Covid-19 are being treated in the three specialist wards at the Borders General Hospital in Melrose or at community hospitals across the region, five of them at the former’s intensive treatment unit, with a further 13 suspected sufferers awaiting test results.