UPDATE: Bedford records 90 new cases

As of today (December 17), Bedford has recorded 90 new cases of coronavirus, with a total of 4,188 people now diagnosed with the virus, according to the latest figures from Public Health England.

There were four deaths in Central Bedfordshire (277), one death in Bedford (218) and five deaths in Luton (241).

From this Saturday, December 19, Bedford will be designated in the tier 3 (Very High alert) category by central government.Read full story here.Central Bedfordshire has 155 new Covid cases with a total of 5,011 - while Luton recorded 185 with a new total of 7,556.

Meanwhile, Buckinghamshire now has 10,076 cases of Covid, Hertfordshire has 23,604 and Milton Keynes has 5,720 cases.

The new figures are recorded between 5pm the previous day to 5pm.

Nationally, the number of coronavirus cases has risen by 35,383 and now stands at 1,948,660.​

The number of new UK cases reported today includes around 11,000 previously unreported cases for Wales as a result of system maintenance in the NHS Wales Laboratory Information Management System.

The number of deaths has risen by 532 to 66,052.

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