Last update: 23 December 2020
Next update: 7 January 2021
Frequency: See Note        

	Report: Week 51 [2] (PDF 173 KB)		Data and Charts (Excel [3]     CSV [4])
	News Release [5] (23 December 2020)		Open Data [6]
	Related Statistics [7]		Archive [8]

Key Findings

• As at the 20th of December, there have been a total of 6,298 deaths registered in Scotland where the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) was mentioned on the death certificate.
• Of the total number of deaths registered in week 51 (14 December to 20 December), there were 203 where COVID-19 was mentioned on the death certificate, a decrease of 23 from the previous week (7 December to 13 December).
• Of deaths involving COVID-19 in the latest week:
  • 81% (165 deaths) were aged 75+, and 7% (15 deaths) were aged under 65.
  • 54% were male (110 deaths) and 46% female (93 deaths).
  • There were 58 deaths in Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board area, 37 in Lanarkshire and 30 in Lothian.
  • At council level, the highest number of deaths occurred in Glasgow City (31) and South Lanarkshire (25).
  • The majority (61%) occurred in hospitals (124 deaths), with 71 deaths in care homes and 8 at home or in non-institutional settings.

Change to frequency of this publication

National Records of Scotland (NRS) has been closely monitoring the weekly number of deaths, and given the increase in recent weeks, we have taken the decision to make additional weekly analysis available through this short publication providing  a weekly breakdown of deaths from all causes and deaths involving COVID-19.  

This weekly publication includes breakdowns by sex, age, health board, local authority and location of death.  It also includes an analysis of excess deaths by location and broad cause of death.

In addition, we publish a comprehensive and detailed analysis of mortality on a monthly basis.  This report includes analysis of deaths occurring in the previous month, and looks at age-standardised death rates, breakdown by deprivation, urban/rural, an analysis of leading causes of death and a breakdown by main pre-existing condition of those who died with COVID-19.  

NRS mortality data (COVID-19 and excess deaths) will continue to be made available on a weekly basis through the Scottish Government’s COVID-19 dashboard [9].

Publication Plans over the Christmas Period

As there will be limited registration activity due to public holidays over the Christmas period, we have made some adjustments to our publication plans for the weekly report as follows:

Deaths registered in week 52 (21st to 27th December) – No publication on Wednesday 30th December

Deaths registered in week 53 (28th December to 3rd January) – Published on Thursday 7th January (will also include figures for week 52)

Contact Us

Please get in touch if you need any further information, or have any suggestions for improvement.

Statistics Customer Services telephone: (0131) 314 4299
E-mail: statisticscustomerservices@nrscotland.gov.uk [10]

For media enquiries, please contact communications@nrscotland.gov.uk [11]