Health News at Your Fingertips

Good afternoon, below is a look at the latest updates from this morning. If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter to share insights or to send tips, I’m on @Gregoryjourno or you can send me an email at gregory.robinson@guardian.co.uk

• 16 homeless people known to have died with coronavirus – Analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has found that 16 homeless people are known to have died with coronavirus in England during the first three months of lockdown.

• Nicola Sturgeon announced no new coronavirus deaths in Scotland for the second consecutive day. Up to eight people are allowed to meet indoors as Sturgeon also urged people to continue to wear face coverings in Scotland

• Six in 10 adults would feel ‘uncomfortable’ eating indoors at a restaurant – In a poll of 1,788 adults in Britain carried out by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) between 2-5 July, 21% of adults said they would feel comfortable or very comfortable doing so, with 60% feeling the opposite.

• Boris Johnson has thanked school leavers for making “sacrifices” that will have saved many lives amid the coronavirus pandemic.

• Today is the last day to register for free meals during the school summer break and access the Covid-19 summer food fund, which will allow schools to order free school meals vouchers for eligible children to cover the summer holidays. Details for registration are here.

• Leading charities have told the government relatives of dementia patients should be treated as key workers so they can visit their family members and be tested for coronavirus where necessary.

My colleague Damian Carrington has reported that air pollution has remained at lower levels in UK towns and cities despite a return to near-normal traffic levels after the easing of coronavirus restrictions.

More here:

Nicola Sturgeon has warned easing lockdown restrictions must not lead to Scots letting down their guard, as she revealed the highest number of new cases of the virus for three weeks.

The first minister said 18 people have tested positive for Covid-19 since Wednesday – taking the total to 18,333.

While the number of new cases remains “very low”, she said, the rise is being “looked at very closely” and serves as a reminder the virus has not gone away.

Nicola Sturgeon has provided more information on the rules regarding face coverings in public. This comes after Sturgeon announced no new coronavirus deaths have been recorded in Scotland for the second day running.

The law coming into force today should not need to be enforced, but the police can issue fines if necessary.

But I am asking everybody to stick to the law, not from a fear of enforcement, but because it is the right thing to do, it helps keep us and other people safe.

I encourage people to see wearing a face covering, for the foreseeable future, when you go to the shops to become as automatic as putting a seatbelt on is in a car already.”

Sturgeon added that wearing a covering was “one of the ways we can show care for and solidarity with each other and allow each other to live less restricted lives without seeing a resurgence in the virus”.

Please everybody comply with this, because it is for the good of all of us. It will help keep us safe and protect everybody.”

Other changes to lockdown in Scotland allow for up to 15 people from five households to meet up outdoors – while “limited indoor gatherings” of up to eight adults from three households can now also take place.

Sturgeon also said it was recommended people avoid meeting with more than four different households in any day.

She said:

The ability to meet indoors even in small numbers is a simple pleasure that has been hard earned by all of us, so enjoy it.

Culture minister Caroline Dinenage said she wears a mask “all the time” after the Government came under pressure to answer why more senior figures had not been pictured wearing face coverings.

Dinenage told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:

I wear mine all the time. I have a fashion design student as a son who has run me up a few on his sewing machine and I wear them all the time. A lot of us are out there wearing them as we go about our daily lives.”

Social media users raised concerns this week after the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, was pictured serving food to customers at a Wagamama restaurant in central London without a face covering.

There have also been no public sightings of Boris Johnson wearing a mask.

No new coronavirus deaths have been recorded in Scotland for the second day running, Nicola Sturgeon has announced.

The first minister told the Scottish government’s coronavirus briefing that 2,490 patients have died in Scotland after testing positive for Covid-19, which marks no change since Wednesday.

Sturgeon said 18,333 people have tested positive for the virus in Scotland, up by 18 from 18,315 on Thursday.

This was the highest rise in positive cases in almost three weeks, she said, and the government would be “looking very closely” at it.

There are 668 people in hospital with confirmed or suspected Covid-19, up 22 in the past 24 hours.

Of these patients, 12 were in intensive care, a rise of three.

Analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has found that 16 homeless people are known to have died with coronavirus in England during the first three months of lockdown.

The deaths were registered between 26 March and 26 June. The ONS cautioned that the figure may be an underestimate of the true number of homeless people who have died with the virus.

The ONS defined homeless people as those who were sleeping rough, using homeless shelters and direct access hostels, or housed in emergency accommodation due to the pandemic at or around the time of death.

The majority of the homeless people identified were men, six lived in London and three in the north-west. The average age of death was 58 for the homeless men – considerably lower than the average age at death involving Covid-19 for men in the general population, at 79.

Details of the homeless women who died were not given to prevent people from being identified due to the low numbers.

Jon Sparkes, from the Crisis charity, said:

When the outbreak started, it was a stark reminder of the risk people who are homeless face from the virus – with no access to a place to self-isolate nor, in some cases, basic sanitation.

We need emergency homelessness legislation to guarantee everyone experiencing homelessness has the security of a safe and settled home. Without this, people risk being forced back on our streets or into crowded shelters, with the danger posed by the virus still very real.