FOUR more people at St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust have died after contracting coronavirus.

At the latest count, two people died at the trust on Sunday, May 3 and two people on May 4.

The latest count means the trust, which runs Whiston, St Helens and Newton hospitals, has now registered 161 coronavirus-related deaths.

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Across England, a further 366 people who tested positive for COVID-19 have died, bringing the total number of confirmed reported deaths in hospitals in England to 21,750.

Patients were aged between 29 and 99 years old.

Out of the 366 patients, 14 of them, aged between 49 and 85 years old, had no known underlying health condition.

In addition, 34 people died who did not test positive for COVID-19 but where the virus was mentioned on their death certificate.

The hospital figures are updated by NHS England each day and include confirmed death cases reported at 5pm the previous day.

These figures only include hospital deaths and do not include deaths outside hospital, such as those in care homes.

However, figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show the number of deaths linked to COVID-19 across all settings.

The latest ONS data published today show that the UK now has the highest death toll in Europe.

The figures show that 29,648 deaths were registered in England and Wales with COVID-19 mentioned on the death certificates by May 2.

Including deaths for Scotland and Northern Ireland, this takes the UK death toll to 32,375.

The year-to-date analysis shows that, of deaths involving the coronavirus up to the week ending April 24, 71.8 per cent (19,643 deaths) occurred in hospital, with the remainder occurring in care homes (5,890 deaths).

St Helens Star: The number of deaths linked to coronavirus in care homes is rising The number of deaths linked to coronavirus in care homes is rising

This is a 12.6 per cent drop in hospital deaths, but an increase of 2,500 deaths in care home deaths compared to the week before.

Coronavirus-related deaths also took place in private homes (1,306 deaths), hospices (301 deaths), other communal establishments (105 deaths) and elsewhere (111 deaths).

Neither NHS England nor the government currently releases recovery figures.

Some individual hospital trusts have begun to publish the number of people it has discharged after contracting coronavirus.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service has requested discharge figures from St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust but it has yet to publish any.