ANOTHER 11 people have died in Scotland after contracting Covid-19 as cases and hospital admissions soar.

Nicola Sturgeon, hosting the first coronavirus briefing for a week, announced the latest figures.

The deaths were recorded in the past 24 hours among people who had tested positive in the previous 28 days.

It brings the total under that measurement to 4633, though the First Minister said the statistics could be “artificially low” since yesterday was a bank holiday.

A further 2529 cases were recorded, with a 14.8% positive rate. Of those, around half are thought to be the new, highly transmissible variant, with that proportion increasing by the day.

Some 1347 people are in hospital with recently confirmed Covid-19, 255 more than a week ago.

Of those, 93 are in intensive care, an increase of 28.

A total of 695 of the new cases were in Greater Glasgow and Clyde, 388 were in Lanarkshire, 322 were in Lothian and 210 were in Tayside.

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Speaking at the Scottish Government briefing, Sturgeon said of the deaths: "Of course every single one of these deaths – I report them here on a daily basis as statistics – but every one of these statistics represents a human being who has lost their lives to this virus and will have left behind grieving families and friends.

"Again, today, my condolences and thoughts go to every individual and family who is in that situation."