The large area of Tyneside recording a freakish drop in Covid cases

In a week where additional Covid measures have been introduced in the UK, there's a surprising area on Tyneside where virus rates are actually dropping.

The arrival of the Omicron variant in the UK has seen infection rates across the country rocket.

On Wednesday, December 15 the UK recorded 78,610 new cases of Covid-19 in what was the worst day since the pandemic began.

The new variant has prompted Boris Johnson to introduce new rules to fight the spread, including the reintroduction of the work from home guidelines and the arrival of Covid passports.

The latest data shows the number of positive Covid cases in local authority areas as of the week ending December 9.

In that week, the centre of Newcastle recorded 1,248 new cases with a total rise of 3.14%.

That placed Newcastle as the 200th worst affected area in the UK, a way off leaders Renfrewshire which saw a 64.08% rise in positive tests.

Despite the presence of Omicron, there is one area on Tyneside that has recorded a bizarre drop in infections.

In Gateshead, there were 808 new Covid cases recorded in the week ending December 9.

That means a 3% drop in positive tests week-on-week, having recorded 833 in the week ending December 2.

South Tyneside is the worst affected area in our region, with a 7.29% rise last week.

Little has changed in North Tyneside, which also recorded a drop in cases, but the % drop was less than 1%.

Speaking on Monday, December 13, the Prime Minister said: "I'm afraid we're now facing an emergency in our battle with the new variant Omicron.

"It is now clear that two doses of vaccine are simply not enough to give the level of protection we all need. But the good news is that our scientists are confident that with a third dose, a booster dose, we can all bring our level of protection back up.

"At this point, our scientists cannot say that Omicron is less severe.

"And even if that proved to be true, we already know it is so much more transmissible that a wave of Omicron through a population that was not boosted would risk a level of hospitalisation that could overwhelm our NHS and lead sadly to very many deaths."