COVID-19 cases in the UK

FOI Reference: FOI/2021/2712

You asked

Please supply a publication which breaks down the actual number of reported UK Covid-19 cases and deaths by age group on a week-on-week basis, with a final total number of Covid-19 cases and deaths by age group since the outbreak began.

To confirm exactly what I am requesting, an example is contained below (using completely made-up figures)

Etc...

The age group bands above are purely an example, I'm sure you have set bands already (I just don't know what they are, hence the request!)

If the deaths could be further broken down into deaths with underlying health conditions versus deaths with no underlying health conditions that would be very helpful.

We said

Thank you for your enquiry.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) only hold death registration data for England and Wales. However, we have collaborated with the constituent countries to produce headline figures COVID-19 related deaths for the UK, for 2020 and 2021.

This information is available in our Provisional weekly deaths in England and Wales publication. The figures are available for broad age groups (01-14; 15-44; 45-64; 65-74; 75-84; 85+). You can access the datasets directly, here.

For numbers of deaths registered in Scotland and Northern Ireland for causes other than COVID-19, please contact National Records of Scotland and Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Centre.

Information on number of COVID-19 cases is produced by Public Health England and published via the government's COVID-19 dashboard.

Deaths due to COVID-19 by main pre-existing condition, and where COVID-19 was recorded as the sole condition on the death certificate, for England and Wales, are available in our Monthly mortality analysis, England and Wales publication. The dataset can be found here. This information is only available for England and Wales for the age groups 0-64 and 65 and over.

We do not publish this information by week or for smaller age groups because data at such a granular level are potentially disclosive. Section 39 of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 (SRSA) renders it an offence to disclose information held by the Statistics Board for statistical purposes that would identify an individual or a body corporate. As we are prohibited by law from publishing statistics in which individual businesses or persons can be identified, we find that Section 44 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) applies. Section 44 is an absolute exemption and no consideration of the public interest test needs to be applied. More information can be found in our disclosure control policy.

If you wish to discuss this further, please contact health.data@ons.gov.uk.