CORONAVIRUS and related deaths across Gwent have topped 650, according to a measure used by the Office for National Statistics.

The latest ONS figure of 663 such deaths in Gwent, to the week ending November 13, is around two-thirds higher than that recorded by Public Health Wales to the same date (399).

The ONS counts all deaths in which coronavirus is mentioned on the death certificate, whether as a primary or underlying cause, a measure which gives a wider picture of the impact of the virus in communities.

Public Health Wales, in its daily update of cases and deaths, states that its figures "include reports... of a death of a hospitalised patient in Welsh hospitals, or care home residents, where Covid-19 has been confirmed with a positive laboratory test and the clinician suspects this was a causative factor in the death".

Its figures "do not include individuals who may have died of Covid-19 but who were not confirmed by laboratory testing, those who died in other settings, or Welsh residents who died outside of Wales".

"The true number of Covid-19 deaths will be higher," states Public Health Wales.

"The ONS reports on both suspected and confirmed Covid-19 deaths in England and Wales using data available on completion of the death registration process."

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According to the ONS measure, there had been 663 coronavirus-related deaths in Gwent (referred to as the Aneurin Bevan University Health Board area) to the week ending November 13, the latest for which ONS figures are available. This was two-thirds (66.2 per cent) more deaths than Public Health Wales was reporting for Gwent on November 13 (399).

The Gwent toll was, by the ONS measure at that point, the second highest in Wales. The highest (707 deaths) was in the Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board area that includes Rhondda Cynon Taf and Merthyr Tydfil, two of the hardest hit areas for coronavirus in Wales not least in the current second wave.

The difference between the ONS and Public Health Wales figures in Cwm Taf Morgannwg however - to that point - was smaller, at 23.4 per cent.

For Wales as a whole, the ONS figure of 3,235 coronavirus and related deaths, to November 13, is almost 50 per cent higher than that recorded by Public Health Wales to the same date (2,167)

The ONS figures also indicate that, to November 13, all but 27 of the 3,235 coronavirus and related deaths it had recorded in Wales since the pandemic began, were among people aged 45 or over.

And of that overall ONS total, 2,397 deaths, or nearly three-quarters, were among people aged 75 and over.