The government have today announced which lockdown tier will be assigned to each part of England when the country moves out of national lockdown on December 2. 

Prime Minister Boris Johnson revealed his plans to return to a tier system earlier this week with stricter restrictions for tier 2 and tier 3 areas.  

The announcement comes as NHS England confirmed on Tuesday that the number hospital deaths in England rose by 353, bringing the total of confirmed Covid-related deaths to 38,865. 

Positivity rates continue to vary “substantially” between different regions of England, the Office of National Statistics said. 

Rates have increased in the East Midlands but are still falling in north-west England. 

In the West Midlands, eastern England, London, south-east England and south-west England, rates “now also appear to be decreasing”. 

The highest rates continue to be in Yorkshire & the Humber (with an estimated 1.9% of people in private households testing positive for Covid-19), north-west England (1.8%) and north-east England (1.7%). 

The lowest rates are in eastern England (0.6%) and south-west England (0.7%). 

What are the key factors the government would have considered?  

The five factors include case detection rates in all age groups, case detection rates in the over 60s and the rate at which cases are rising or falling. 

The two other measures are the positivity rate – the number of positive cases detected as a percentage of tests taken – and pressure on the NHS, including current and projected occupancy. 

But Downing Street has declined to give any further details on the indicators. 

Bournemouth Echo: Which areas are in which tiers? (Yui Mok/PA)Which areas are in which tiers? (Yui Mok/PA)

Which areas are in which tiers?

Tier 1: Medium alert

South East

  • Isle of Wight

South West

  • Cornwall
  • Isles of Scilly

Tier 2: High alert

North West

  • Cumbria
  • Liverpool City Region
  • Warrington and Cheshire

Yorkshire

  • York
  • North Yorkshire

West Midlands

  • Worcestershire
  • Herefordshire
  • Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin

East Midlands

  • Rutland
  • Northamptonshire

East of England

  • Suffolk
  • Hertfordshire
  • Cambridgeshire, including Peterborough
  • Norfolk
  • Essex, Thurrock and Southend on Sea
  • Bedfordshire and Milton Keynes

London

  • all 32 boroughs plus the City of London

South East

  • East Sussex
  • West Sussex
  • Brighton and Hove
  • Surrey
  • Reading
  • Wokingham
  • Bracknell Forest
  • Windsor and Maidenhead
  • West Berkshire
  • Hampshire (except the Isle of Wight), Portsmouth and Southampton
  • Buckinghamshire
  • Oxfordshire

South West

  • South Somerset, Somerset West and Taunton, Mendip and Sedgemoor
  • Bath and North East Somerset
  • Dorset
  • Bournemouth
  • Christchurch
  • Poole
  • Gloucestershire
  • Wiltshire and Swindon
  • Devon

Tier 3: Very High alert

North East

  • Tees Valley Combined Authority:
  • Hartlepool
  • Middlesbrough
  • Stockton-on-Tees
  • Redcar and Cleveland
  • Darlington
  • North East Combined Authority:
  • Sunderland
  • South Tyneside
  • Gateshead
  • Newcastle upon Tyne
  • North Tyneside
  • County Durham
  • Northumberland

North West

  • Greater Manchester
  • Lancashire
  • Blackpool
  • Blackburn with Darwen

Yorkshire and The Humber

  • The Humber
  • West Yorkshire
  • South Yorkshire

West Midlands

  • Birmingham and Black Country
  • Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent
  • Warwickshire, Coventry and Solihull

East Midlands

  • Derby and Derbyshire
  • Nottingham and Nottinghamshire
  • Leicester and Leicestershire
  • Lincolnshire

South East

  • Slough (remainder of Berkshire is tier 2: High alert)
  • Kent and Medway

South West

  • Bristol
  • South Gloucestershire
  • North Somerset