Public Health England said that a total of 12,806 cases had been confirmed in the City of York Council area, which compares with 12,755 yesterday.

The rolling weekly rate has risen to 78.8 cases per 100,000, compared with 74.5 yesterday.

The city's rate is just below the national average for England of 81.3 and for the UK of 80.9, both of which are also up.

In North Yorkshire, the rate has risen sharply to 52.1 cases per 100,000 population from to 45.1 yesterday, meaning that the county is now shaded blue instead of green on a national PHE map, like York.

In the East Riding of Yorkshire area, the rate has increased to 35.2 cases per 100,000 population from 32.2 yesterday.

The figures emerged after Prof Adam Finn, who advises the government on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that a third wave of the coronavirus pandemic was “definitely under way."

He said: “It’s going up, perhaps we can be a little bit optimistic it’s not going up any faster, but nevertheless it’s going up, so this third wave is definitely under way.

“We can conclude that the race is firmly on between the vaccine programme, particularly getting older people’s second doses done, and the Delta variant third wave.”