Glitch hides thousands of recorded coronavirus cases

Over 15,000 cases of COVID-19 went unreported due to a technical glitch within Public Health England (PHE).

This has led to delays in tracing and informing the close contacts of these thousands of positive cases. Also, the glitch has meant that daily figures of cases in the past week have been inaccurately low.

Approximately 15,841 cases between the 25th of September and the 2nd of October were not included in the daily UK case figures.

The issue was resolved and the excluded figures passed on to tracers in the early hours of Saturday.

The opposition party, Labour, has called the glitch "shambolic".

This comes as Kate Bingham, head of the UK government's COVID-19 vaccine task force, says that there "no vaccination of people under 18".

She said: "It's an adult-only vaccine for people over 50, focusing on health workers, care home workers and the vulnerable."