UPDATE: Bedford records over 240 new coronavirus cases today

As of today (January 7), Bedford has recorded 246 new cases of coronavirus, with a total of 8,031 people now diagnosed with the virus, according to the latest figures from Public Health England.

There were no deaths recorded in Bedford (266), four deaths in Luton (296) and six deaths in Central Bedfordshire (351).

On Monday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced England would go into a third lockdown to help reduce the spread of the virus which is now being driven by a new mutation.

Central Bedfordshire has 213 new Covid cases with a total of 9,766, while Luton recorded 401 with a new total of 11,942.

Meanwhile, Buckinghamshire now has 19,416 cases of Covid, Hertfordshire has 48,651 and Milton Keynes has 12,702 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 52,618 and now stands at 2,889,419. The number of deaths has risen by 1,162 to 78,508.

As of January 3, 1,296,432 people in the UK had received the first dose of the vaccination for COVID-19.

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