Decision day as cases rise
A decision on whether or not East Renfrewshire is plunged into Level 3 restrictions could be made today.
The Scottish Government confirmed last week it was closely monitoring the local authority area after the number of new covid cases rocketed across the county.
National clinical director Professor Jason Leitch said a decision around the lockdown status of four councils - East Renfrewshire, Glasgow City, Moray and Midlothian would be made today or tomorrow.
I t comes as both Renfrewshire and East Renfrewshire council areas report no further deaths due to Covid-19.
Renfrewshire has seen no deaths for a second consecutive week, meaning the virus death toll stands at 535.
For East Renfrewshire, it is
currently 225.
Prof Leitch told the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland programme that the rate of infection in these areas and subsequent restrictions could be helped by locals sticking to the rules.
He said: “That’s true in East Renfrewshire, it’s true in Midlothian where we’ve seen a little uptick in the numbers, so we just need to be careful.
“We will give advice all this week and we will be speaking to the First Minister and her cabinet later in the week – and they will decide on Thursday or Friday what to do with the two that are in Level 3 and any that might have to move.”
Currently East Renfrewshire has 94.2 positive cases per 100,000.
But council areas should only have Level 2 status if the infection rate is below 50.
In the week to May 17 a total of 87 new cases were recorded in the region.
On May 12 alone, 19 new covid cases were identified.
It is currently unknown if the Indian variant of the virus is driving the increased infections in East Renfrewshire specifically.
That strain - which is 50 per cent more infectious than the dominant Kent variant - is however believed to be driving the spike in cases across Glasgow.
Yesterday, it was also revealed that the number of people receiving treatment for Covid-19 in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde hospitals has doubled.
The latest data shows that there are 33 patients in hospitals across the region, up from 15 on May 4.