Coronavirus: NISRA says COVID-19 death total is 516 with 232 (45 per cent) in care homes

The new breakdown, published on Friday morning, shows 516 deaths mentioning COVID-19 on the death certificate have occurred in total, up to May 1, including those registered up to and including May 6.

Over the course of the week up to May 1 there were 115 more deaths related to COVID-19 39 in hospitals, 71 in care homes, one in a hospice and 4 in other settings.

The bulletin states: "Of these 516 total deaths involving COVID-19 occurring up to May 1, 253 (49.0%) occurred in hospital, 232 (45.0%) occurred in care homes, four (0.8%) occurred in hospices and 27 (5.2%) occurred at residential addresses or another location.

"The proportion of all COVID-19 deaths occurring in care homes has therefore increased from 40.1%4 by 24th April to 45.0% in the year-to-date to May 1.

"The 236 deaths in care homes and hospices involved 66 separate establishments. In the week ending 1 st May, over half (61.7%) of the 115 COVID-19 related deaths were in care homes, up from 57.0% in the week ending April 24."

The bulletin shows that for the fifth consecutive week, there were more deaths registered in the north than there have typically been in the same week in recent years.

However, there was a fall in the number of registered deaths from the previous week.

While there have now been 516 COVID -19 related deaths in total the number of registered deaths mentioning the illness was 494.

The bulletin states that 124 deaths mentioning COVID-19 on the death certificate were registered in week 17, accounting for 29.0% of all deaths in that week and bringing the total number of COVID-19 related deaths registered in calendar year 2020 to 494.

NISRA state: "The provisional number of deaths registered in Northern Ireland in the week ending May 1, 2020 (week 17) was 427; 43 fewer than in week 16, but 107 more than the 5-year average of 320.

"Over the last 5 weeks, 704 ‘excess deaths’ (i.e. deaths above the average for the corresponding week in previous years) have been registered in Northern Ireland.

"Over two-fifths (42.2%) of all deaths in week 17 were classified as ‘respiratory’ (180). Please note that all COVID-19 related deaths have been included in this classification.

"There have been 6,142 deaths registered in the year-to-date, 32.2% of which (1,975) were classified as ‘respiratory’. The number of respiratory deaths is higher in the year-to-date than the 5-year average of 1,778 though the proportion of respiratory deaths over the two time periods (31.2%) is similar.

"One hundred and twenty four deaths mentioning COVID-19 on the death certificate were registered in week 17, accounting for 29.0% of all deaths in that week and bringing the total number of COVID-19 related deaths registered in calendar year 2020 to 494."