UPDATE: Bedford records 16 new confirmed cases in the last 24 hours

As of today (March 12), Bedford has recorded 16 new cases of coronavirus, with a total of 13,190 people now diagnosed with the virus, according to the latest figures from Public Health England.

There were no coronavirus-related deaths recorded in Bedford (483), two deaths in Central Bedfordshire (567) and two in Luton (488).

Central Bedfordshire has 27 new Covid cases with a total of 15,370, while Luton recorded 43 with a new total of 19,272.

Meanwhile, Buckinghamshire now has 30,581 cases of Covid, Hertfordshire has 74,942 and Milton Keynes has 19,460 cases.

The new figures are recorded between 5pm the previous day to 5pm and unfortunately don't include the number of patients who have recovered from Covid-19.

Nationally, the number of coronavirus cases has risen by 6,609 and now stands at 4,248,286. The number of deaths has risen by 175 to 125,343.

As of March 11, in the UK, 23,314,525 people had received the first dose of the vaccination for COVID-19, and 1,445,078 had received their second dose.

The figures come from the Government website which is available for the public to view here.