In early-February 2020, the first cases of COVID-19 in the United Kingdom (UK) were confirmed. As of December 2023, the South East had the highest number of confirmed first episode cases of the virus in the UK with 3,180,101 registered cases, while London had 2,947,727 confirmed first-time cases. Overall, there has been 24,243,393 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the UK as of January 13, 2023.

COVID deaths in the UK COVID-19 was responsible for 202,157 deaths in the UK as of January 13, 2023, and the UK had the highest death toll from coronavirus in western Europe. The incidence of deaths in the UK was 297.8 per 100,000 population as January 13, 2023.

Current infection rate in Europe The infection rate in the UK was 43.3 cases per 100,000 population in the last seven days as of March 13, 2023. Austria had the highest rate at 224 cases per 100,000 in the last week.

For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic is having a damaging impact on the global hotel industry. Preliminary results for London hotels showed that compared to the same period in 2019, occupancy rates from March 1 to 7, 2020 fell by 21 percent, resulting in a fall in RevPar by 27.7 percent. More recent forecasts in April however showed a much bigger impact on RevPar and occupancy rates,

For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

Due to changes in the collection and availability of data on COVID-19 this page will no longer be updated. The webpage will no longer be available as of 11 May 2023. On-going, reliable sources of data for COVID-19 are available via the COVID-19 dashboard, Office for National Statistics, and the UKHSA

This page provides a weekly summary of data on deaths related to COVID-19 published by NHS England and the Office for National Statistics. More frequent reporting on COVID-19 deaths is now available here, alongside data on cases, hospitalisations, and vaccinations. This update contains data on deaths related to COVID-19 from:

NHS England COVID-19 Daily Deaths - last updated on 28 June 2022 with data up to and including 27 June 2022.


ONS weekly deaths by Local Authority - last updated on 16 August 2022 with data up to and including 05 August 2022.

Summary notes about each these sources are provided at the end of this document.

Note on interpreting deaths data: statistics from the available sources differ in definition, timing and completeness. It is important to understand these differences when interpreting the data or comparing between sources.

Weekly Key Points

An additional 24 deaths in London hospitals of patients who had tested positive for COVID-19 and an additional 5 where COVID-19 was mentioned on the death certificate were announced in the week ending 27 June 2022. This compares with 40 and 3 for the previous week. A total of 306 deaths in hospitals of patients who had tested positive for COVID-19 and 27 where COVID-19 was mentioned on the death certificate were announced for England as whole. This compares with 301 and 26 for the previous week. The total number of COVID-19 deaths reported in London hospitals of patients who had tested positive for COVID-19 is now 19,102. The total number of deaths in London hospitals where COVID-19 was mentioned on the death certificate is now 1,590. This compares to figures of 119,237 and 8,197 for English hospitals as a whole. Due to the delay between death occurrence and reporting, the estimated number of deaths to this point will be revised upwards over coming days These figures do not include deaths that occurred outside of hospitals. Data from ONS has indicated that the majority (79%) of COVID-19 deaths in London have taken place in hospitals.

Recently announced deaths in Hospitals

21 June 22 June 23 June 24 June 25 June 26 June 27 June London No positive test 0 0 1 4 0 0 0 London Positive test 3 7 2 10 0 0 2 Rest of England No positive test 2 6 4 4 0 0 6 Rest of England Positive test 47 49 41 58 6 0 81

16 May 23 May 30 May 06 June 13 June 20 June 27 June London No positive test 14 3 4 0 4 3 5 London Positive test 45 34 55 20 62 40 24 Rest of England No positive test 41 58 33 23 47 23 22 Rest of England Positive test 456 375 266 218 254 261 282 Deaths by date of occurrence

21 June 22 June 23 June 24 June 25 June 26 June 27 June London 20,683 20,686 20,690 20,691 20,692 20,692 20,692 Rest of England 106,604 106,635 106,679 106,697 106,713 106,733 106,742 Interpreting the data The data published by NHS England are incomplete due to:

delays in the occurrence and subsequent reporting of deaths deaths occurring outside of hospitals not being included

The total deaths reported up to a given point are therefore less than the actual number that have occurred by the same point. Delays in reporting NHS provide the following guidance regarding the delay between occurrence and reporting of deaths: Confirmation of COVID-19 diagnosis, death notification and reporting in central figures can take up to several days and the hospitals providing the data are under significant operational pressure. This means that the totals reported at 5pm on each day may not include all deaths that occurred on that day or on recent prior days. The data published by NHS England for reporting periods from April 1st onward includes both date of occurrence and date of reporting and so it is possible to illustrate the distribution of these reporting delays. This data shows that approximately 10% of COVID-19 deaths occurring in London hospitals are included in the reporting period ending on the same day, and that approximately two-thirds of deaths were reported by two days after the date of occurrence.

Deaths outside of hospitals The data published by NHS England does not include deaths that occur outside of hospitals, i.e. those in homes, hospices, and care homes. ONS have published data for deaths by place of occurrence. This shows that, up to 05 August, 79% of deaths in London recorded as involving COVID-19 occurred in hospitals (this compares with 44% for all causes of death). This would suggest that the NHS England data may underestimate overall deaths from COVID-19 by around 20%.

Comparison of data sources

Note on data sources

NHS England provides numbers of patients who have died in hos

Due to changes in the collection and availability of data on COVID-19, this website will no longer be updated. The webpage will no longer be available as of 11 May 2023. On-going, reliable sources of data for COVID-19 are available via the COVID-19 dashboard and the UKHSA

GLA Covid-19 Mobility Report

Since March 2020, London has seen many different levels of restrictions - including three separate lockdowns and many other tiers/levels of restrictions, as well as easing of restrictions and even measures to actively encourage people to go to work, their high streets and local restaurants. This reports gathers data from a number of sources, including google, apple, citymapper, purple wifi and opentable to assess the extent to which these levels of restrictions have translated to a reductions in Londoners' movements.

The data behind the charts below come from different sources. None of these data represent a direct measure of how well people are adhering to the lockdown rules - nor do they provide an exhaustive data set. Rather, they are measures of different aspects of mobility, which together, offer an overall impression of how people Londoners are moving around the capital. The information is broken down by use of public transport, pedestrian activity, retail and leisure, and homeworking.

Public Transport

For the transport measures, we have included data from google, Apple, CityMapper and Transport for London. They measure different aspects of public transport usage - depending on the data source. Each of the lines in the chart below represents a percentage of a pre-pandemic baseline.

https://cdn.datapress.cloud/london/img/dataset/60e5834b-68aa-48d7-a8c5-7ee4781bde05/2025-06-09T20%3A54%3A15/6b096426c4c582dc9568ed4830b4226d.webp" alt="Embedded Image" />

activity Source Latest Baseline Min value in Lockdown 1 Min value in Lockdown 2 Min value in Lockdown 3 Citymapper Citymapper mobility index 2021-09-05 Compares trips planned and trips taken within its app to a baseline of the four weeks from 6 Jan 2020 7.9% 28% 19% Google Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Location data shared by users of Android smartphones, compared time and duration of visits to locations to the median values on the same day of the week in the five weeks from 3 Jan 2020 20.4% 40% 27% TfL Bus Transport for London 2022-10-30 Bus journey ‘taps' on the TfL network compared to same day of the week in four weeks starting 13 Jan 2020 - 34% 24% TfL Tube Transport for London 2022-10-30 Tube journey ‘taps' on the TfL network compared to same day of the week in four weeks starting 13 Jan 2020 - 30% 21% Pedestrian activity

With the data we currently have it's harder to estimate pedestrian activity and high street busyness. A few indicators can give us information on how people are making trips out of the house:

https://cdn.datapress.cloud/london/img/dataset/60e5834b-68aa-48d7-a8c5-7ee4781bde05/2025-06-09T20%3A54%3A15/bcf082c07e4d7ff5202012f0a97abc3a.webp" alt="Embedded Image" />

activity Source Latest Baseline Min value in Lockdown 1 Min value in Lockdown 2 Min value in Lockdown 3 Walking Apple Mobility Index 2021-11-09 estimates the frequency of trips made on foot compared to baselie of 13 Jan '20 22% 47% 36% Parks Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Frequency of trips to parks. Changes in the weather mean this varies a lot. Compared to baseline of 5 weeks from 3 Jan '20 30% 55% 41% Retail & Rec Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Estimates frequency of trips to shops/leisure locations. Compared to baseline of 5 weeks from 3 Jan '20 30% 55% 41% Retail and recreation

In this section, we focus on estimated footfall to shops, restaurants, cafes, shopping centres and so on.

https://cdn.datapress.cloud/london/img/dataset/60e5834b-68aa-48d7-a8c5-7ee4781bde05/2025-06-09T20%3A54%3A16/b62d60f723eaafe64a989e4afec4c62b.webp" alt="Embedded Image" />

activity Source Latest Baseline Min value in Lockdown 1 Min value in Lockdown 2 Min value in Lockdown 3 Grocery/pharmacy Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Estimates frequency of trips to grovery shops and pharmacies. Compared to baseline of 5 weeks from 3 Jan '20 32% 55.00% 45.000% Retail/rec <a href="https://ww

As of January 12, 2023, COVID-19 has been responsible for 202,157 deaths in the UK overall. The North West of England has been the most affected area in terms of deaths at 28,116, followed by the South East of England with 26,221 coronavirus deaths. Furthermore, there have been 22,264 mortalities in London as a result of COVID-19.

For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

All data relating to Coronavirus (COVID-19) mortality and long-term outdoor air pollution in London.

The Opinion Research team set up an online diary to capture the views, behaviours and experiences of a sample of Londoners during the coronavirus outbreak. Commencing in late May, this online diary ran for 8 weeks. Fortnightly summary reports can be found accessed below, and included: Week 1 and 2 – reflected on experiences during lockdown to date and explored views on easing lockdown. Week 3 and 4 – explored priorities for London’s recovery, both short and long-term, and views on the Test and Trace system. Week 5 and 6 – explored growing disengagement with the coronavirus outbreak and reflected on some of the positive impacts of lockdown.​ Week 7 and 8 – explored the idea of a 15-minute city and aspirations for the future of London.

In early-February, 2020, the first cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19) were reported in the United Kingdom (UK). The number of cases in the UK has since risen to 24,243,393, with 1,062 new cases reported on January 13, 2023. The highest daily figure since the beginning of the pandemic was on January 6, 2022 at 275,646 cases.

COVID deaths in the UK COVID-19 has so far been responsible for 202,157 deaths in the UK as of January 13, 2023, and the UK has one of the highest death toll from COVID-19 in Europe. As of January 13, the incidence of deaths in the UK is 298 per 100,000 population.

Regional breakdown The South East has the highest amount of cases in the country with 3,123,050 confirmed cases as of January 11. London and the North West have 2,912,859 and 2,580,090 cases respectively.

For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

Vaccinations in London Between 8 December 2020 and 15 September 2021 5,838,305 1st doses and 5,232,885 2nd doses have been administered to London residents.

Differences in vaccine roll out between London and the Rest of England London Rest of England Priority Group Vaccinations given Percentage vaccinated Vaccinations given Percentage vaccinated Group 1 Older Adult Care Home Residents 21,883 95% 275,964 96% Older Adult Care Home Staff 29,405 85% 381,637 88% Group 2 80+ years 251,021 83% 2,368,284 93% Health Care Worker 174,944 99% 1,139,243 100%* Group 3 75 - 79 years 177,665 90% 1,796,408 99% Group 4 70 - 74 years 252,609 90% 2,454,381 97% Clinically Extremely Vulnerable 278,967 88% 1,850,485 95% Group 5 65 - 69 years 285,768 90% 2,381,250 97% Group 6 At Risk or Carer (Under 65) 983,379 78% 6,093,082 88% Younger Adult Care Home Residents 3,822 92% 30,321 93% Group 7 60 - 64 years 373,327 92% 2,748,412 98% Group 8 55 - 59 years 465,276 91% 3,152,412 97% Group 9 50 - 54 years 510,132 90% 3,141,219 95% Data as at 15 September 2021 for age based groups and as at 12 September 2021 for non-age based groups * The number who have received their first dose exceeds the latest official estimate of the population for this group There is considerable uncertainty in the population denominators used to calculate the percentage vaccinated. Comparing implied vaccination rates for multiple sources of denominators provides some indication of uncertainty in the true values. Confidence is higher where the results from multiple sources agree more closely. Because the denominator sources are not fully independent of one another, users should interpret the range of values across sources as indicating the minimum range of uncertainty in the true value. The following datasets can be used to estimate vaccine uptake by age group for London:

ONS 2020 mid-year estimates (MYE). This is the population estimate used for age groups throughout the rest of the analysis.


Number of people ages 18 and over on the National Immunisation Management Service (NIMS)


ONS Public Health Data Asset (PHDA) dataset. This is a linked dataset combining the 2011 Census, the General Practice Extraction Service (GPES) data for pandemic planning and research and the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES). This data covers a subset of the population.

Vaccine roll out in London by Ethnic Group Understanding how vaccine uptake varies across different ethnic groups in London is complicated by two issues:

Ethnicity information for recipients is unavailable for a very large number of the vaccinations that have been delivered. As a result, estimates of vaccine uptake by ethnic group are highly sensitive to the assumptions about and treatment of the Unknown group in calculations of rates.

For vaccinations given to people aged 50 and over in London nearly 10% do not have ethnicity information available,

The accuracy of available population denominators by ethnic group is limited. Because ethnicity information is not captured in official estimates of births, deaths, and migration, the available population denominators typically rely on projecting forward patterns captured in the 2011 Census. Subsequent changes to these patterns, particularly with respect to international migration, leads to increasing uncertainty in the accuracy of denominators sources as we move further away from 2011.

Comparing estimated population sizes and implied vaccination rates for multiple sources of denominators provides some indication of uncertainty in the true values. Confidence is higher where the results from multiple sources agree more closely. Because the denominator sources are not fully independent of one another, users should interpret the range of values across sources as indicating the minimum range of uncertainty in the true value. The following population estimates are available by Ethnic group for London:

GLA Ethnic group population projections - 2016 as at 2021


ONS Population Denominators produced for Race Disparity Audit as at 2018


ETHPOP population projections produced by the University of Leeds as at 2020

Antibody prevalence estimates As part of the ONS Coronavirus (COVID-19) Infection Survey ONS publish a modelled estimate of the percent of the adult population testing positive for antibodies to Coronavirus by region. Antibodies can be generated by vaccination or previous infection.

Vaccine effects on cases, hospitalisations and deaths When the vaccine roll out began in December 2020 coronavirus cases, hospital admissions and deaths were rising steeply. The peak of infections came in London in early January 2021, before reducing during the national lockdown and as the vaccine roll out progressed. As the vaccine roll out began in older age groups the effect of vaccinations can be separated from the effect of national lockdown by comparing changes in cases, admissions and deaths

These documents were produced through a collaboration between GLA, PHE London and Association of Directors of Public Health London. The wider impacts slide set pulls together a series of rapid evidence reviews and consultation conversations with key London stakeholders. The evidence reviews and stakeholder consultations were undertaken to explore the wider impacts of the pandemic on Londoners and the considerations for recovery within the context of improving population health outcomes. The information presented in the wider impact slides represents the emerging evidence available at the time of conducting the work (May-August 2020). The resource is not routinely updated and therefore further evidence reviews to identify more recent research and evidence should be considered alongside this resource. It is useful to look at this in conjunction with the ‘People and places in London most vulnerable to COVID-19 and its social and economic consequences’ report commissioned as part of this work programme and produced by the New Policy Institute. Additional work was also undertaken on the housing issues and priorities during COVID. A short report and examples of good practice are provided here. These reports are intended as a resource to support stakeholders in planning during the transition and recovery phase. However, they are also relevant to policy and decision-making as part of the ongoing response. The GLA have also commissioned the University of Manchester to undertake a rapid evidence review on inequalities in relation to COVID-19 and their effects on London.

Due to changes in the collection and availability of data on COVID-19, this website will no longer be updated. The webpage will no longer be available as of 11 May 2023. On-going, reliable sources of data for COVID-19 are available via the COVID-19 dashboard and the UKHSA

GLA Covid-19 Mobility Report

Since March 2020, London has seen many different levels of restrictions - including three separate lockdowns and many other tiers/levels of restrictions, as well as easing of restrictions and even measures to actively encourage people to go to work, their high streets and local restaurants. This reports gathers data from a number of sources, including google, apple, citymapper, purple wifi and opentable to assess the extent to which these levels of restrictions have translated to a reductions in Londoners' movements.

The data behind the charts below come from different sources. None of these data represent a direct measure of how well people are adhering to the lockdown rules - nor do they provide an exhaustive data set. Rather, they are measures of different aspects of mobility, which together, offer an overall impression of how people Londoners are moving around the capital. The information is broken down by use of public transport, pedestrian activity, retail and leisure, and homeworking.

Public Transport

For the transport measures, we have included data from google, Apple, CityMapper and Transport for London. They measure different aspects of public transport usage - depending on the data source. Each of the lines in the chart below represents a percentage of a pre-pandemic baseline.

https://cdn.datapress.cloud/london/img/dataset/60e5834b-68aa-48d7-a8c5-7ee4781bde05/2025-06-09T20%3A54%3A15/6b096426c4c582dc9568ed4830b4226d.webp" alt="Embedded Image" />

activity Source Latest Baseline Min value in Lockdown 1 Min value in Lockdown 2 Min value in Lockdown 3 Citymapper Citymapper mobility index 2021-09-05 Compares trips planned and trips taken within its app to a baseline of the four weeks from 6 Jan 2020 7.9% 28% 19% Google Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Location data shared by users of Android smartphones, compared time and duration of visits to locations to the median values on the same day of the week in the five weeks from 3 Jan 2020 20.4% 40% 27% TfL Bus Transport for London 2022-10-30 Bus journey ‘taps' on the TfL network compared to same day of the week in four weeks starting 13 Jan 2020 - 34% 24% TfL Tube Transport for London 2022-10-30 Tube journey ‘taps' on the TfL network compared to same day of the week in four weeks starting 13 Jan 2020 - 30% 21% Pedestrian activity

With the data we currently have it's harder to estimate pedestrian activity and high street busyness. A few indicators can give us information on how people are making trips out of the house:

https://cdn.datapress.cloud/london/img/dataset/60e5834b-68aa-48d7-a8c5-7ee4781bde05/2025-06-09T20%3A54%3A15/bcf082c07e4d7ff5202012f0a97abc3a.webp" alt="Embedded Image" />

activity Source Latest Baseline Min value in Lockdown 1 Min value in Lockdown 2 Min value in Lockdown 3 Walking Apple Mobility Index 2021-11-09 estimates the frequency of trips made on foot compared to baselie of 13 Jan '20 22% 47% 36% Parks Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Frequency of trips to parks. Changes in the weather mean this varies a lot. Compared to baseline of 5 weeks from 3 Jan '20 30% 55% 41% Retail & Rec Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Estimates frequency of trips to shops/leisure locations. Compared to baseline of 5 weeks from 3 Jan '20 30% 55% 41% Retail and recreation

In this section, we focus on estimated footfall to shops, restaurants, cafes, shopping centres and so on.

https://cdn.datapress.cloud/london/img/dataset/60e5834b-68aa-48d7-a8c5-7ee4781bde05/2025-06-09T20%3A54%3A16/b62d60f723eaafe64a989e4afec4c62b.webp" alt="Embedded Image" />

activity Source Latest Baseline Min value in Lockdown 1 Min value in Lockdown 2 Min value in Lockdown 3 Grocery/pharmacy Google Mobility Report 2022-10-15 Estimates frequency of trips to grovery shops and pharmacies. Compared to baseline of 5 weeks from 3 Jan '20 32% 55.00% 45.000% Retail/rec <a href="https://ww

This paper summarises the latest evidence and analysis on the impacts of COVID-19 on London’s economy so far and on the economic outlook so that key actors and stakeholders engaged in responding to the pandemic can have a readily available evidence base to inform policy responses.

• This briefing presents evidence on the socio-economic impact of COVID-19 on London and Londoners​
• Topics included in the briefing focus on recent data releases published in the preceding months that tell us how social policy issues are evolving in London since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic

For more on the health and demographic impacts see the Demographic Impact Briefing and for labour market impacts see Labour Market Analysis. A page linking to all Covid-19 related data and analyses can be found here.

The Community Engagement team at the Greater London Authority (GLA) commissioned this report to identify and examine past and present projects which involve collecting Londoners experiences of COVID-19 through a variety of creative and non-traditional materials. The purpose of the report is to: provide an overview of projects and activities which record Londoners COVID-19 stories and experiences. outline who is responsible for these projects and activities (individuals, museums, community groups, charities, community interest groups, non-profits, other institutions and organisations). analyse the voices of individuals/groups/communities targeted in the projects and activities. highlight obvious gaps in the collected data which can inform future programmes geographically map out projects and other activities which record COVID-19 stories and experiences across Greater London. The data provides insight into trends and patterns in COVID-19 collecting projects and activities that have been carried out in London from March 2020 to March 2021. Reflections and final suggestions on how to navigate these projects and activities for specific next steps in the Community-Led Recovery Programme, targeted missions, suggestions etc. will be discussed later in this report. In particular, this report provides information relevant to the London Community Story (LCS) Programme, one of the two strands of the Community-Led Recovery programme. Alongside this report is a dataset outlining 160 COVID-19 collecting projects that took place in London. The dataset gives project names, boroughs, material types, collecting organisation type and organisation names. We encourage you to use this dataset as a starting point and then do your own additional research on the 160 projects. If you are aware of a project that has not been included, please let us know and we can add it.

The COVID Symptom Tracker (https://covid.joinzoe.com/) mobile application was designed by doctors and scientists at King's College London, Guys and St Thomas’ Hospitals working in partnership with ZOE Global Ltd – a health science company.

This research is led by Dr Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London and director of TwinsUK a scientific study of 15,000 identical and non-identical twins, which has been running for nearly three decades.

The dataset schema includes:

Demographic Information (Year of Birth, Gender, Height, Weight, Postcode) Health Screening Questions (Activity, Heart Disease, Diabetes, Lung Disease, Smoking Status, Kidney Disease, Chemotherapy, Immunosuppressants, Corticosteroids, Blood Pressure Medications, Previous COVID, COVID Symptoms, Needs Help, Housebound Problems, Help Availability, Mobility Aid) COVID Testing Conducted How You Feel? Symptom Description Location Information (Home, Hospital, Back From Hospital) Treatment Received The data is hosted within the SAIL Databank, a trusted research environment facilitating remote access to health, social care, and administrative data for various national organisations.

The process for requesting access to the data is dependent on your use case. SAIL is currently expediting all requests that feed directly into the response to the COVID-19 national emergency, and therefore requests from NHS or Government institutions, or organisations working alongside such care providers and policymakers to feed intelligence directly back into the national response, are being expedited with a ~48-hour governance turnaround for such applications once made. Please make enquiries using the link at the bottom of the page which will go the SAIL Databank team, or to Chris Orton at c.orton@swansea.ac.uk

SAIL is welcoming requests from other organisations and for longer-term academic study on the dataset, but please note if this is not directly relevant to the emergency research being carried out which directly interfaces with national responding agencies, there may be an access delay whilst priority use cases are serviced.

Please note: the CVST dataset in SAIL has not been updated since 01/11/2023.

This dataset requires additional governance approvals from the data provider before data can be provisioned to a SAIL project.

This is a subset of data taken from https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk / https://coronavirus-staging.data.gov.uk. Please follow this link for more information: https://coronavirus-staging.data.gov.uk/about-data

On March 4, 2020, the first death as a result of coronavirus (COVID-19) was recorded in the United Kingdom (UK). The number of deaths in the UK has increased significantly since then. As of January 13, 2023, the number of confirmed deaths due to coronavirus in the UK amounted to 202,157. On January 21, 2021, 1,370 deaths were recorded, which was the highest total in single day in the UK since the outbreak began.

Number of deaths among highest in Europe
The UK has had the highest number of deaths from coronavirus in western Europe. In terms of rate of coronavirus deaths, the UK has recorded 297.8 deaths per 100,000 population.

Cases in the UK The number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK was 24,243,393 as of January 13, 2023. The South East has the highest number of first-episode confirmed cases of the virus in the UK with 3,123,050 cases, while London and the North West have 2,912,859 and 2,580,090 confirmed cases respectively. As of January 16, the UK has had 50 new cases per 100,000 in the last seven days.

For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

Given the paramount impacts of COVID-19 on people’s lives in the capital of the UK, London, it was foreseeable that the city’s crime patterns would have undergone significant transformations, especially during lockdown periods. This study aims to testify the crime patterns’ changes in London, using data from March 2020 to March 2021 to explore the driving forces for such changes, and hence propose data-driven insights for policy makers and practitioners on London’s crime deduction and prevention potentiality in post-pandemic era. (1) Upon exploratory data analyses on the overall crime change patterns, an innovative BSTS model has been proposed by integrating restriction-level time series into the Bayesian structural time series (BSTS) model. This novel method allows the research to evaluate the varied effects of London’s three lockdown periods on local crimes among the regions of London. (2) Based on the predictive results from the BSTS modelling, three regression models were deployed to identify the driving forces for respective types of crime experiencing significant increases during lockdown periods. (3) The findings solidified research hypotheses on the distinct factors influencing London’s specific types of crime by period and by region. In light of the received evidence, insights on a modified policing allocation model and supporting the unemployed group was proposed in the aim of effectively mitigating the surges of crimes in London.

At the end of 2020 the GLA commissioned the University of Essex to analyse the impact on Londoners of the Covid-19 crisis, of the emergency policies put in place since March 2020 and of some counterfactual policy options, including the continuation of the £20 weekly uplift in Universal Credit and Working Tax Credit. The researchers used UKMOD, the UK tax-benefit microsimulation model, to conduct their analysis.