More than 200 cases of coronavirus were recorded in Manchester over a single day last week, latest official figures show.
It's the first time a daily figure for the city has topped 200, and is likely due in part to an outbreak linked to two university halls of residence.
Public Health England figures, the latest available, today revealed 205 Covid-19 cases were recorded in Manchester last Thursday.
But overall, the latest figures appear to indicate a slight levelling off in infections.
Infection rates are still going up rapidly in Manchester, but are no longer doubling week-on-week.
Today's figures - to the week ending September 25 - added a further 486 cases onto the infection tally, down from 728 on Sunday.
But cases are rising fastest in Trafford.
Trafford's infection rate - the number of people who test positive per 100,000 of the population - has now gone above 100 for the first time.
There were 66 cases in Trafford recorded last Thursday, and in the previous highest daily total there was only 36, the figures showed.
Bolton still has the highest infection rate in Greater Manchester - 231.
That's followed by Manchester (207) and Bury (193).
The figures, for the seven days to September 25, are based on tests carried out in laboratories (pillar one of the Government's testing programme) and in the wider community (pillar two).
The rate is expressed as the number of new cases per 100,000 people.
Data for the most recent three days - September 26-28 - has been excluded as it is incomplete and likely to be revised.
Knowsley has the highest rate in England, with 422 new cases recorded in the seven days to September 25 - the equivalent of 279.7 cases per 100,000 people, the figures show.
This is up from 152.5 in the seven days to September 18.
Burnley has the second highest rate, up sharply from 157.4 to 269.9 with 240 new cases.
Liverpool is in third place, where the rate has jumped from 165.4 to 262.2 with 1,306 new cases.
The infection rates in the other eight areas of Greater Manchester are:
- Bolton 231
- Manchester 207
- Bury 193
- Oldham 188
- Rochdale 165
- Salford 156
- Tameside 143
- Wigan 133
- Trafford 109
- Stockport 89
The government said that, as of 9am on Monday, there had been a further 4,044 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK, taking the overall number of cases confirmed to 439,013.
The government also said a further 13 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Monday.
This brings the UK total to 42,001.
Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies show there have now been 57,600 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate.
