Chesterfield and North East Derbyshire Moved to Local COVID Alert Level: High

The Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, spoke moments ago in the House of Commons announcing Chesterfield and North East Derbyshire among other areas, including London, Essex, Barrow-In-Furness, York and Erewash, will be moved from Local COVID Alert Level: Medium to High from 00:01 on Saturday 17th October 2020.

Although cases are rising across Derbyshire, cases in the three areas remain among the highest in the county. In Chesterfield, the rate of infection is at 118 per 100,000 people and North East Derbyshire is at 149 per 100,000 people.

The announcement comes after discussions between the Government, council leaders and MPs on how to manage the infection rate rise in the three districts.

The following restrictions will come into force on Saturday:

Derbyshire’s Director of Public Health Dean Wallace, who is leading the county’s response to the outbreak, urged people to follow the tighter ‘lockdown’ rules. “We all have a duty to do everything it takes to stop the spread of this highly contagious virus.

“The steep rise in the numbers of cases is deeply concerning, although not surprising given Chesterfield and North East are so close to Sheffield, and Erewash borders Nottinghamshire, which are all currently on ‘high’ alert and under extra restrictions. It’s more important than ever that we all work together to beat this.

“I cannot emphasise enough that from Saturday people from different households should not be mixing indoors, unless it is with people who are in their ‘bubble’ and they should stick to the ‘Rule of 6’ when outside.

“I know it’s difficult but I’m asking everyone to summon their famous Derbyshire spirit and play their part to keep themselves, their family, friends and colleagues safe,” he said.

Lee Rowley, MP for North East Derbyshire, said: “As rates have climbed in our area, we have been in intensive discussions with local public health leaders in the last few days and it is clear that there is a significant increase in cases all across North East Derbyshire and Chesterfield.  Given the quick increase, it was increasingly likely that additional restrictions would be proposed for our area and that has now resulted in us moving up a tier.  Mark and myself, along with local Council leaders, all know that this will cause challenges for residents and our immediate focus now will be on helping to get on top of this outbreak so we can go back down a tier as soon as possible.”

The extra restrictions will be reviewed after four weeks.

MP for Chesterfield, Toby Perkins spoke to his Facebook following shortly after the announcement in Parliament, warning Chesterfield residents that the measures do not go far enough, calling on the Government to consider a circuit breaker lockdown:

More follows…

Find out more information about what this will mean for our area here.