The number of coronavirus cases per 100,000 people in the last week has doubled compared to the previous seven days in Great Yarmouth, South Norfolk and East Suffolk.

The figures, from Public Health England data for the seven days to September 28, show the number of Covid-19 cases have risen in five of the eight local authorities in Norfolk and Waveney.

Just Breckland, Broadland and Norwich have seen figures fall in the past week.

Great Yarmouth has seen the biggest rise in cases per 100,000 people with 50.3 cases in the week up to September 28 compared to 25.2 in the seven days to September 21.

The rise in positive coronavirus cases in Great Yarmouth has sparked a plea for people to take extra care to stop the spread of the disease - and head off potential restrictions or lockdowns.

Two people are in the James Paget University Hospital after the rate in the borough went up to about 49 cases per 100,000 people over the past seven days. There were about 25 cases per 100,000 people in the previous week.

It means there have been about 30 new cases over the past week and all of them are in what health bosses called ‘working age people’ - people aged 20 to 50.

Meanwhile there have also been big rises in South Norfolk, where cases per 100,000 have gone up to 15.6 in the seven days to September 28 compared to 7.8 the previous week, and in East Suffolk where there were 11.2 cases per 100,000 people in the week to September 28 compared to 4.8 the previous week.

Cases however have been on the downward spiral in Norwich where there were 12.8 cases per 100,000 people in the week to September 28 compared to 16.4 the previous week, in Broadland where cases fell to 6.9 from 9.9 and in Breckland where there were just 7.9 cases per 100,000 in the seven days to September 28 compared to 10.7 in the week to September 21.

In comparison, the number of new cases in England over the seven days up to September 28 has shot up to 59 per 100,000 compared to 49.8 in the previous week.

Experts have previously warned that describing the daily figure as a record could be “misleading” as it is not clear how many people were actually infected during the height of the first wave due to a lack of community testing at the time.