Crucial meetings this week for NW Wales

A crunch meeting is set to be held this week over the possibility of more restrictions to halt the spread of Covid-19 in Gwynedd and Anglesey.

While Bangor has been under a local lockdown since 6pm on Saturday, the rest of Gwynedd and neighbouring Anglesey remain the only parts of North Wales which are not.

But with cases on the rise, on Monday the health minister confirmed that council leaders and health officials would be meeting “early this week,” with the potential of wider restrictions on the table.

The latest figures show the 7-day rolling infection rates for Gwynedd as 89.1 per 100,000 people between October 2-8, with Health Minister Vaughan Gething describing the surge seen in Bangor as associated “largely but not wholly with younger people and the student population.”

On Friday the Welsh Government confirmed that the incidence rate varies from 152 cases (per 100,000) in Arfon - which includes Bangor - to 55 in Dwyfor and just 18 in Meirionnydd.

But with cases in neighbouring Anglesey also hitting 48.5 over the same period, this brings Anglesey and swathes of Gwynedd close to, or beyond, the 50 cases per 100,000 over seven days previously earmarked as sparking potential local lockdowns.

At the Welsh Government’s daily briefing, Mr Gething said: “We’re going to be having a meeting with leaders not just from Gwynedd but also the wider area, including obviously Anglesey, early this week to understand whether we do need to take additional measures.

“We’re seeing a small number of unlinked cases and also we understand a couple of clusters that TTP is on top of, but we need to understand not just the numbers and the data.

“50 is a potential trigger for action but we need to understand the wider picture: when the island had the outbreak at 2 Sisters it had much higher rates per 100,000 but we were able to control and isolate that particular outbreak and it didn’t break into community transmission.

“But this is a good example of why we need to have a conversation about local, regional or national action and to understand how we have a set of measures the public can understand and support to help us regain some control over coronavirus.

“But frankly this is also about reducing harm to minimise the number of people who need hospital treatment and may otherwise die this coming winter.”