COVID-19 death toll hits 57,400 in UK

The latest British official figures showed Tuesday that COVID-19 death toll had hit 57,400 as British people are being urged to take the pandemic seriously or face "a bumpy road" ahead reported Xinhua.

More than 57,400 deaths involving coronavirus have been registered in Britain, according to new figures from the Office for National Statistics.

However, data released Tuesday also found that weekly deaths involving COVID-19 in England and Wales have dropped to the lowest number since mid-March.

The figures came after a further 2,948 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus were recorded in Britain as of 9:00 a.m. BST (0800 GMT) on Monday.

Meanwhile, deputy chief medical officer Jonathan Van-Tam said coronavirus must be taken very seriously again or the country will face "a bumpy ride over the next few months."

On Monday, British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said that a coronavirus vaccine is "most likely" to be ready in the first few months of 2021, if it gets approved.

Hancock said it was "looking up" that the vaccine being developed by experts at the University of Oxford and pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca would be granted approval for use soon after trials in several countries, including Britain, the United States and Brazil, the Evening Standard newspaper reported.

His statement came at a time when countries, such as Britain, China, Russia and the United States, are engaged in a race against time to develop a vaccine for the novel coronavirus.