NO new cases of coronavirus have been recorded in St Helens, the latest official figures show.

Public Health England figures show that 752 people had been confirmed as testing positive for COVID-19 by 9am Wednesday morning (May 27) in St Helens, in line with the same time on Tuesday.

A week before, there were 741 cases since the start of the outbreak in mid-March.

The stable number of cases over the last 24 hours contrasts with the picture across the UK as a whole, where the rate of increase was one per cent.

They were among the 25,260 cases recorded across the North West, a figure which rose by 102 over the period.

Cumulative case counts include patients who are currently unwell, have recovered and those that have died.

Figures released yesterday showed four more people have died at St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust after contracting coronavirus.

The NHS figures show that two people died on Sunday, May 24, and two people on Monday, May 25.

Since the outbreak began, 189 deaths linked to COVID-19 have been recorded by the trust, which runs Whiston, St Helens and Newton hospitals.

Meanwhile, people with coronavirus will have their contacts traced from Thursday in a bid to control the spread of COVID-19 and help ease lockdown restrictions, the Government has announced.

NHS Test and Trace will officially launch across England with the help of 25,000 contact tracers, while an accompanying app is still delayed by several weeks.

The aim of the scheme – which will run alongside calls to keep up social distancing and handwashing – is to cut off routes of transmission for coronavirus and prevent a second peak of infection.

Launching the scheme, Health and Social Care Secretary Matt Hancock said: “As we move to the next stage of our fight against coronavirus, we will be able to replace national lockdowns with individual isolation and, if necessary, local action where there are outbreaks.

“NHS Test and Trace will be vital to stopping the spread of the virus. It is how we will be able to protect our friends and family from infection, and protect our NHS.

“This new system will help us keep this virus under control while carefully and safely lifting the lockdown nationally.”

Baroness Dido Harding, executive chairwoman of NHS Test and Trace, said: “NHS test and trace is designed to enable the vast majority of us to be able to get on with our lives in a much more normal way, but it requires all of us to do our civic duty.

“We will be trading national lockdown for individual isolation if we have symptoms.

“Instead of 60 million people being in national lockdown, a much smaller number of us will be told we need to stay at home, either for seven days if we are ill or 14 days if we have been in close contact.”

Under the plans, anyone with coronavirus symptoms will immediately self-isolate and book a test, preferably at a testing centre or, if necessary, for delivery to their home.

If the test proves negative, they do not need to do anything more.

But if the test is positive, NHS contact tracers or local public health teams will call them, email or send a text asking them to share details of the people they have been in close contact with and places they have visited.

The team then emails or texts those close contacts, telling them they must stay home for 14 days even if they have no symptoms, to avoid unknowingly spreading the virus.

Household members do not need to isolate at this point.

If the contact themselves then falls ill, they book themselves a test.

If this is positive, they stay home for seven days or until their symptoms have passed, and their household stays home for 14 days.

If it is negative, the contact must still complete their initial 14-day isolation period.

A close contact is defined as anybody who has been in close contact with an infected person in the two days before symptoms appear and up to seven days afterwards.

This includes people in the same household, those who have been within one metre, or who have been within two metres for 15 minutes or more.

Baroness Harding said the Government could impose restrictions and fines on those who do not comply with the rules, but said ministers were not setting out to be punitive.

She said: “I think everyone involved in it has real faith in the British public’s ability to follow our guidance.

“If you look at what’s happened over the last two months, that’s what we as a country have done.

“So we’re not launching this with fines and penalties for people who don’t self-isolate, or who don’t give us their contacts.

“What we’re doing is asking everyone to play their part in protecting themselves, their families, and their loved ones.

“Now, the Secretary of State does have the public health legal ability to impose fines and penalties but that’s not how we’re launching this.

“We will beat this together, rather than making it punitive.”

Across the UK, 267,240 people had tested positive for coronavirus as of 9am on Wednesday, up from 265,227 at the same point on Tuesday, Department of Health and Social Care figures show.

As of 5pm on Tuesday, 37,460 had died.