The 7-day case rate in Rutland has dropped again, reflecting national trends.

England's smallest county continues to record no fatalities, after the weekend saw its first deaths since April.

Today, Rutland recorded 20 positive tests with Covid 19, compared with 16 yesterday, 20 last Thursday and 21 the Thursday before.

The 7-day rate is now 270.5 cases per 100,000, compared to Sunday's peak of 388.2, and 285.5 yesterday. Last Thursday, it was 318.1 and it was 175.3 the Thursday before.

Whilst the Rutland 7-day rate has fluctuated a little, the England average has steadily risen in recent weeks until Friday's peak of 540, which has since fallen to 375.2 today.

However, there has been a large increase in testing recently, with around a million tests a day and 7 million over the past week, though yesterday saw around 900,000 tests, giving a weekly figure of 6 million.

Rutland has now recorded 2210 cases recorded since the start of the pandemic- about one case for every 18 residents. This compares with the England average of about one-in-12.

The number of deaths is now 66, about one for every 600 residents, which compares with the national average of one-in-500 residents.

Prior to the latest fatality last weekend, the last recorded such death in England's smallest county was on Wednesday April 28. Before that it was Thursday March 25.

Meanwhile, in Lincolnshire, the South Kesteven 7-day Covid infection rate has continued its downward trend despite the district recording 51 cases today.

The latest numbers mean the district has seen a drop of around a third in this rate since Friday, similar to the large drop recorded nationally.

Today's 51 positive tests compares with 48 yesterday, 46 last Thursday and 61 the Thursday before.

The 7-day case rate has dropped from Friday's peak of 353.9 cases per 100,000 of population to 226.1 today, though it still remains much higher than for much of the past few months.

Last Thursday, it stood at 342.6 and 201.5 cases per 100,000 the Thursday before that.

Overall, there have been 9239 cases in South Kesteven since the start of the pandemic- equivalent to about one for about 16 residents in the district.

South Kesteven hasn't recorded a Covid-19 related death since Wednesday May 5.

The last fatality priority to that was Tuesday March 25, showing South Kesteven has experienced just two deaths with Covid-19 in more than 15 weeks.

The overall total remains at 270, about one for each 600 of the population, compared to the England average of one-in-500.

Overall, today, there were 618 new cases of coronavirus confirmed in Greater Lincolnshire, as the weekly number of people getting jabbed continues to fall, sparking a call to action from local health bosses.

The government's COVID-19 dashboard on Thursday reported 428 new cases in Lincolnshire, 110 in North East Lincolnshire and 80 in North Lincolnshire.

NHS figures have reported no further hospital deaths in Northern Lincolnshire and Goole hospitals trust.

Government figures, however, showed two further updates to their deaths data for North East Lincolnshire residents.

On Wednesday, the dashboard recorded 599 new cases, with 363 of those in Lincolnshire, 154 in North East Lincolnshire and 82 in North Lincolnshire.

There was one death reported yesterday in North Lincolnshire.

Nationally, on Thursday cases increased by 31,117 to 5,801,561 while deaths rose by 85 to a total of 129,515.

In national news, the debate over the "pingdemic" has continued, with the number of self-isolation alerts sent by the COVID-19 app rising to a record 689,313.

The figures covering the seven days to July 21 are an increase of more than 70,000 compared to last week.

Boston's own Jonathan Van Tam, the deputy chief medical officer for England, has been answering questions on BBC Radio 1 today where he revealed vaccines have prevented 22 million cases and 60,000 deaths.

However, he said young people are still being taken to intensive care and that COVID variants had "diluted the effectiveness" of the vaccine.

He warned of a "bumpy" Autumn and winter, but said vaccines could prevent any further lockdowns.

Foreign secretary Dominic Raab has told Sky News that more countries could be added to the amber and green travel lists as the government gets "increasingly confident".

The next review is a week on Thursday, however, on Wednesday the government announced fully vaccinated travellers from the EU and the US would not have to quarantine when arriving in England, Scotland or Wales from an amber list country.