Health bosses are "seeing a faster rate of increase than we'd like to" as daily cases across Greater Lincolnshire hit the highest since February.

There were 264 cases confirmed across Greater Lincolnshire on Monday – the largest rise since February 3.

However, in South Kesteven despite 12 cases recorded yesterday, its 7-day case rate actually fell.

Lincolnshire County Council's Assistant Director of Public Health Andy Fox said that of 600 positive cases last week, the main proportion was among younger people, with only a handful of over 60s and around 200 school-aged children testing positive.

He added however that around 50% of the youngest eligible bands have had their first dose.

The government's new health secretary Sajid Javid and Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday were optimistic the July 19 lockdown restrictions would go ahead.

Asked if he was confident in the deadline, Mr Fox said if restrictions were lifted on July 19 the country could expect to see further rises but hoped vaccine take-up and "some combination of summer weather" would counteract it.

"We're going to see cases increasing steeply up to and probably way past July 19," he said.

"Hopefully at some point they will peak and come down but it will be very hard to say when that will be."

He said the government will be looking at vaccination data rather than case rates so he hoped there would be a good take-up of dosage in the next few weeks.

On the latest figures and predictions for the future, he said: "We're seeing a significant increase now in Lincolnshire, it's following the pattern we've seen across the rest of the country, but you know there is a sense that we're seeing a faster rate of increase than we'd like to see at this point."

The government's COVID-19 dashboard on Monday recorded 185 new cases in Lincolnshire, 153 in North East Lincolnshire and 30 in North Lincolnshire.

The number is the highest since February 3, when 299 cases were confirmed – though that could be down to a delay in reporting some cases across the weekend.

North Lincolnshire's numbers also hit 10,000 cases.

Among the districts, South Kesteven recorded 12 cases, giving a grand total of 7844 since the start of the pandemic.

The 7-day case rate fell from 40 cases per 100,000 over the weekend to 38.8. The number has hovered around this figure for about a week, with small fluctuations. It remains less than a third of the England average of 128.7, which has been rising steadily in recent weeks.

There were no deaths reported in government or NHS England figures.

South Kesteven has recorded 270 deaths within 28 days of a positive test, with the last death more than a month ago and the last one prior to that about two months ago.

Lincolnshire CCG reports three Covid 19 patients in county hospitals.

Nationally, cases increased by 22,868 to 4,755,078 while deaths rose by three to 128,103.

Coronavirus data for Greater Lincolnshire on Monday, June 28

10,000 in North Lincolnshire (up 16)

2,195 deaths (no change)

1,622 from Lincolnshire (no change)

271 from North East Lincolnshire (no change)

42 at Lincolnshire Community Health Service hospitals (no change)

454 in Northern Lincolnshire (NLAG) (no change)