Deaths will rise to hundreds a day if coronavirus continues at current rate, Vallance warns

The UK could see 50,000 new coronavirus cases a day by mid-October, leading to more than 200 daily deaths, if the rate of increase in infections continues to rise at current rates, the government’s chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance has warned.

And chief medical officer Chris Whitty warned that the country was facing a “very serious” threat from Covid-19 for the next six months.

Addressing the nation from Downing Street, the prime minister’s most senior scientific and medical advisers stressed that the numbers were not a prediction, but represented the scale the pandemic could reach in Britain if the public does not follow safety advice such as Boris Johnson’s “rule of six”.

Prof Whitty said: “At this point the seasons are against us. We're now getting into the seasons - late autumn and winter - which benefit respiratory viruses and it is very likely they will benefit Covid as they do, for example, flu.

“So we should see this as a six-month problem that we have to deal with collectively. It’s not indefinite - science will in due course ride to our rescue.

“But in this period of the next six months, I think we have to realise that we have to take this collectively very seriously.”