Coronavirus levels discovered in sewage across Scotland have increased by around 20 per cent in the last week, new official data has revealed.
According to Scottish Government statistics, covid in wastewater has fluctuated while cases of the deadly virus have remained at around the same level for a number of weeks.
It comes as SNP Health Secretary Humza Yousaf announced during a Scottish Government briefing in parliament last Tuesday that there were "early signs" that cases would creep up.
Many experts have predicted there would be a rise in people testing positive for Covid-19 at and following the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow.
Last week Nicola Sturgeon's covid adviser Professor Devi Sridhar, a professor of global public health at the University of Edinburgh, said seeing pictures of hundreds of people in close proximity at the summit had left her anxious knowing how "fragile" the situation has been.
The latest government analysis showed: "Nationwide, Covid-19 levels in wastewater have shown an increase since last week (October 20 to 26), increasing by approximately 20 per cent.
"Whilst the measured wastewater levels have fluctuated, case numbers remained steady at around 50 new cases per 100,000 population (7-day average) over the last month."
The findings by the government revealed that levels of covid from samples at 106 sewage plants on November 2 was 68 million gene copies per person per day.
At the week ending October 26 there were around 56 million gene copies per person per day.
In the last 24-hour period two people died from coronavirus.
The latest figures for Scotland showed that 2,908 new cases had also been identified in that same time period.
There were 27,540 tests for Covid-19 carried out, with 11.1 per cent of these being positive for the virus.
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