Edinburgh’s Covid-19 hotspots have been revealed as Nicola Sturgeon gets set to make an announcement on new restrictions next week.
John Swinney warned this weekend that Scots should take the new Omicron variant seriously and not be under the illusion that it is less dangerous, as over 8000 new cases were recorded in the past day throughout Scotland.
The latest Public Health data shows that there were 515 new cases in Edinburgh, with 1809 over the latest week.
The PHS numbers reveal that the six areas with the highest infection rates are Gilmerton South and the Murrays, Mountcastle, Queensferry East, Joppa, Trinity and Portobello.
Gilmerton South and the Murrays had a positivity rate of 782 infections per 100,000 residents. Overall they had 29 infections in the last week.
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Mountcastle was next with a rate of 743 new infections over the last week. They had 19 new cases recorded on the PHS heatmap.
Queensferry East were third with 718 new infections per 100,00. And they had a total of 36 cases over the week.
Joppa recorded a test positivity rate of 705 in the last week. From all their residents they had 37 cases in the last week.
Trinity was fifth with a rate of 696 per 100,000. They had 33 new infections over the past week according to the PHS heatmap.
And sixth was Portobello had 682 in the last week. With a total of 30 new cases recorded in the neighbourhood.
The Public Health Scotland daily update this afternoon (December 12) showed that there were 4002 new infections across the country in the last day.
There were also 541 people in hospital yesterday with recently confirmed COVID-19 across Scotland.
Nicola Sturgeon said on Friday that she could not rule out imposing restrictions on things like people gathering at pubs, restaurants or football stadiums.
She said: "We know that any additional protective measures will cause social and economic harms especially after almost two years of this pandemic,
"But we also know from past experience that early action is often needed when dealing with this virus – in fact acting early is often the best way of acting proportionately.
"So we can’t rule out further measures and I’m afraid we can’t avoid the advice that I have shared with you today."
