Deaths involving COVID-19 Week 1: 4 Jan-10 Jan

As at 10 January, 7,074 deaths have been registered in Scotland where the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) was mentioned on the death certificate, according to statistics published by National Records of Scotland (NRS) today. 

In the week 4-10 January, 384 deaths were registered that mentioned COVID-19 on the death certificate, this is an increase of 197 deaths from the previous week.

The statistics for 4-10 January show that 73% of the 384 deaths were of people aged 75 and over, and 9% were aged under 65.

The highest number of deaths occurred in North Lanarkshire at 53, followed by Glasgow City at 50 and City of Edinburgh at 34.

The majority of deaths occurred in hospitals representing 251 deaths, 113 occurred in care homes and 19 at home or in a non-institutional setting.

To place these statistics in context, the total number of all-cause deaths registered in the week ending 10 January was 1,704, 34% higher than the average for that week in the period 2015 to 2019.

Pete Whitehouse, Director of Statistical Services, said: 

“Each statistic represents the death of a loved one and heartbreak for families and friends across the country. 

“As expected, the number of deaths registered in week 1 of 2021 is significantly higher than that of week 53 of 2020 as registrars have dealt with backlogs from the Christmas period.  It is difficult to monitor trends in death registrations at this time of year due to the impact of public holidays on registration activity.  Next week’s report will include analysis of deaths by date of occurrence  and this will give a clearer indication of the trend at the end of 2020.”

The publication Deaths involving coronavirus (COVID-19) in Scotland is available on the NRS website.