Another Covid-19-related death has been confirmed in the government’s weekly surveillance report.

This brings the total number in the island since the start of the pandemic to 105.

The death occurred in a nursing or residential care home.

The current seven-day average for reported positive results is 25, down from 30 last week, and 76 the week before – indicating that the trend of falling case numbers reported from testing is continuing.

The effective reproduction number (Rt) was 0.56 this week, slightly up on previous weeks.

Last week, the Rt number was 0.38.

Case ascertainment and calculation of the reproduction number is, of course, dependent on patterns of testing and reporting so it is likely that there are more cases than are currently notified.

This caveat has applied throughout the pandemic when Covid has been transmitting on island, although the change to LFD self testing and self reporting may have impacted on that to an unknown extent. Further changes to testing guidance published on April 1 are likely having an additional impact.

Some of the fall in seven-day average daily reporting seen this week is likely to be due to these changes in testing and reporting.

However, there is also likely to be a true fall as this would be in line with the fall in cases currently being reported in the UK from the Office of National Statistics Infection Survey.

This week’s report also includes the latest update from the waste water surveillance pilot project, a partnership between the government and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Waste water testing for SARS-CoV-2 RNA offers a way of sampling across the population. Results from the latest update show a plateau in SARS-CoV-2 RNA from week ending April 30 to week ending May 7.

These results are in line with the trend in cases from testing data.

This week’s report does not include data from the hospital. This is due to the small number of people in hospital with the virus.