The UK recorded 981 deaths within 28 days of a positive COVID-19 test on Wednesday - the highest number since 24 April.
The number of new coronaviruscases reported in the 24 hours to 9am on Wednesday was 50,023 - slightly down on Tuesday's 53,135 which was the most since the pandemic began.
The high fatality figure could be partly down to a delay in reporting deaths over Christmas.
There have now been a total of 72,548 coronavirus-related deaths in the UK and 2,432,888 cases.
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The news came shortly after Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced that an additional 20 million people in England will move into Tier 4 restrictions in an effort to limit the spread of the virus.
This will mean 44 million people will be in Tier 4 from Thursday (78% of England's population), 12 million people will be in Tier 3 (22% of the population), while no area will be in Tier 2.
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Mr Hancock warned that the new highly-transmissible variant of COVID-19, first reported in the UK, was now spreading across England, adding that cases are "doubling fast".
Some primary schools in areas with the highest rates of coronavirus will not open on that date, he added, although it was not clear at that stage which areas this would include.
Exam year students will return on 11 January, with other secondary school students to follow on 18 January, to enable preparations for the testing of pupils and staff to take place.
But there was some good news earlier on Wednesday, with the UK's medicines regulator announcing it had approved a second vaccine for use.
The vaccine by Oxford University and AstraZeneca offers a "route out of this pandemic", Mr Hancock told Sky News.
Secondary schools across most of England are to remain closed for an extra two weeks for most pupils, to help regain control of coronavirus.
Education Secretary Gavin Williamson told the Commons that exam-year pupils would return a week earlier than their schoolmates in the week of 11 January.
And in a small number of areas with the highest infection rates, primaries will remain closed temporarily.
Mr Williamson said temporary shutdowns would cut chains of transmission.
It comes after most of England was put into the toughest Tier 4 restrictions, and follows warnings from medics about pressure on hospitals and from government scientists about the increasing contagiousness of the new strain of coronavirus.
Mr Williamson said the delay in reopening secondary schools would allow head teachers to develop and set up mass testing plans for their pupils.
He said: "Because Covid infection rate is particularly high among this age group, we are going to allow more time so that every school and college is able to fully roll out testing for their pupils and staff.
"This kind of mass testing will help protect not just children and young people, but benefit everyone in the community.
"It will break those chains of transmission that are making infection rates shoot up."
It would also ensure schools were safer when pupils did return, he said.
The small number of primary schools affected would be re-opened as soon as possible, Mr Williamson said, adding that testing for primary school staff would continue.
'Last-minute mess'
It is a significant step, as ministers have repeatedly stated that schools would remain open - and even threatened council areas which wanted to close their schools early for Christmas with legal action.
The general secretary of the Nasuwt teachers' union, Patrick Roach, said the announcement offered belated clarity but did not go far enough.
"Stronger preventative action is needed to limit the further transmission of the coronavirus in schools and colleges, including enabling the greater use of remote and blended learning which would enable effective social distancing which is vital to minimising virus transmission."
The leader of the National Association of Head Teachers, Paul Whiteman, said: "This is another last-minute mess which could so easily have been avoided if the government had listened to school leaders before the holidays.
"Instead, back then, schools which wanted to shift to remote learning were threatened with legal action. Now we have a situation where the government is instructing schools to reduce the amount of teaching time available.
"If we'd had the freedom to take action before the holidays, we might have been in a position to have more schools open for more pupils. School leaders will be baffled, frustrated and justifiably angry tonight."
Schools were struggling to remain Covid-safe during the autumn term, despite the intense efforts of teachers and staff, with huge numbers of pupils contracting the virus and then being sent home.
All primary schools had been due to fully reopen on 4 January, along with secondary schools opening for vulnerable children and those sitting exams this year (Years 11 and 13).
Remaining secondary school pupils were to start term working remotely from home.
Effectively the whole process has been shunted back a week. This is two weeks after the usual start of term.
Scotland: Schools will start term on 11 January, with learning taking place online until at least 18 January.
Wales: Term will start with online learning, but the majority of pupils are expected to resume face-to-face lessons by 11 January. A full return to the classroom is expected to be completed by 18 January.
Northern Ireland: All schools will initially reopen for face-to-face teaching at the start of term, but years 8 to 10 will move to remote learning from 25 January for at least two weeks.
Schools in all the UK nations are remaining open for vulnerable children. England, Wales and Scotland have also committed to maintaining face-to-face teaching for children of key workers.
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Millions more people are facing tighter restrictions after the government announced an extension of Tier 4 rules in England in an effort to limit the spread of the coronavirus.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock said that although the changes will "place a significant burden on people, and especially on businesses affected", they were "absolutely necessary because of the number of cases that we've seen".
He told MPs: "Sharply rising cases and the hospitalisations that follow demonstrate the need to act where the virus is spreading."
Mr Hancock confirmed that the remaining parts of the South East currently not in Tier 4 will be under the new restrictions within hours, along with large parts of the Midlands, the North East, the North West and the South West.
He was speaking as concerns grow about a new variant of the virus, which appears to be more transmissible and which he said was "now spreading across most of England".
The changes will move an additional 20 million people into Tier 4, meaning a total of 44 million people (78% of England's population) will be in that toughest tier.
Areas that will be covered by the Tier 4 rules from 00.01am on Thursday are:
Leicester City
Leicestershire - Oadby and Wigston, Harborough, Hinckley and Bosworth, Blaby, Charnwood, North West Leicestershire, Melton
Lincolnshire - City of Lincoln, Boston, South Kesteven, West Lindsey, North Kesteven, South Holland, East Lindsey
Northamptonshire - Corby, Daventry, East Northamptonshire, Kettering, Northampton, South Northamptonshire, Wellingborough
Derby and Derbyshire - Derby, Amber Valley, South Derbyshire, Bolsover, North East Derbyshire, Chesterfield, Erewash, Derbyshire Dales, High Peak
Nottingham and Nottinghamshire - Gedling, Ashfield, Mansfield, Rushcliffe, Bassetlaw, Newark and Sherwood, Nottinghamshire, Broxtowe
Birmingham and Black Country - Dudley, Birmingham, Sandwell, Walsall, Wolverhampton
Coventry
Solihull
Warwickshire - Rugby, Nuneaton and Bedworth, Warwick, North Warwickshire, Stratford-upon-Avon
Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent - East Staffordshire, Stafford, South Staffordshire, Cannock Chase, Lichfield, Staffordshire Moorlands, Newcastle under Lyme, Tamworth, Stoke-on-Trent
Lancashire - Burnley, Pendle, Blackburn with Darwen, Ribble Valley, Blackpool, Preston, Hyndburn, Chorley, Fylde, Lancaster, Rossendale, South Ribble, West Lancashire, Wyre
Cheshire and Warrington - Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Warrington
Cumbria - Eden, Carlisle, South Lakeland, Barrow-in-Furness, Copeland, Allerdale
MPs have overwhelmingly approved the Brexit trade deal to pave the way for the UK-EU agreement to come into force at 11pm tomorrow.
The House of Commons backed the agreement, struck between Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the EU on Christmas Eve, by 521 votes to 73 - a majority of 448.
The deal, which stretches to 1,246 pages and covers £660bn worth of trade, will now pass to the House of Lords to be considered by peers.
Image:The PM's signature on the Brexit trade agreement
The government is hoping the agreement will pass through all of its required parliamentary stages in a single day on Wednesday.
And, therefore, it will be fully ratified ahead of the end of the Brexit transition period at 11pm on New Year's Eve.
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Little more than an hour after the vote, Mr Johnson added his formal signature to the EU-UK trade deal in Downing Street.
"The treaty that I've just signed is not the end, it is a new beginning and I think the beginning of what will be a wonderful relationship between the UK and our friends and partners in the EU," he said.
More from Boris Johnson
The documents had been flown to London in an RAF plane after being signed by European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels on Wednesday morning.
The prime minister earlier told MPs the deal would allow the UK to take control of its "national destiny".
"The central purpose of this bill is to accomplish something that the British people always knew in their hearts could be done but which we were continually told was impossible," he said.
"We were told we could not have our cake and eat it... namely that we could trade and cooperate with our European neighbours on the closest terms of friendship and goodwill, whilst retaining sovereign control of our laws and our national destiny."
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PM on Brexit: We have nothing to fear
Mr Johnson hailed the deal as allowing "a new relationship between Britain and the EU as sovereign equals".
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer had ordered his party to vote in favour of the deal, arguing the alternative would be for the UK to leave the Brexit transition period without a EU trade agreement in place.
In a message to those MPs who planned to vote against the deal - including some within his own party - he said: "When the default is no deal it's not a mark of how pro-European you are to reject implementing this treaty.
"It isn't in the national interest to duck a question or to hide in the knowledge that others will save you from the consequences of your own vote."
Sir Keir said the agreement would "put in place a floor from which we can build a strong future relationship with the EU".
However, the Labour leader criticised the "thin deal" as having "many flaws" and said there was a "gaping hole" in the agreement's provisions for the services sector.
Image:Boris Johnson formally signed the EU-UK trade agreement in Downing Street. Pic: Andrew Parsons/Number 10
One Labour MP, Bell Ribeiro-Addy, voted against the deal while 36 other Labour MPs recorded no vote.
This suggested they had abstained and so also rebelled against party leader Sir Keir by failing to back the EU trade deal.
Among those was Helen Hayes, who resigned her shadow cabinet role after choosing not to support Labour's official position.
Two Conservative former cabinet ministers, Brexiteers Owen Paterson and John Redwood, also both abstained to rebel against the prime minister.
During the more than four hours' debate on the deal, former prime minister Theresa May took Sir Keir to task for failing to back her efforts in negotiating with the EU last year, when he was shadow Brexit secretary.
She told the now Labour leader: "He said he wanted a better deal - he had the opportunity in early 2019 when there was the opportunity of a better deal on the table and he voted against it."
Mrs May welcomed Mr Johnson's agreement, but suggested Brussels would be favoured under the terms of the deal.
"We have a deal in trade that benefits the EU, but not a deal in services that would have benefited the UK," she added.
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What's in the Brexit trade deal?
Senior Conservative eurosceptic Sir Bill Cash compared the prime minister to both Ancient Greek statesman Pericles and Alexander the Great, adding Mr Johnson had "saved our democracy".
His fellow Tory MP Mark Francois, who chairs the European Research Group of Conservative Brexiteers, claimed he and his other Leave-supporting "Spartans" could now "lower our spears" in the "battle for Brexit".
SNP, Plaid Cymru and Liberal Democrat MPs voted against the agreement.
And the DUP also voted against the deal after reiterating their anger at the post-Brexit arrangements for the Irish border - known as the Northern Ireland Protocol - that Mr Johnson signed up to with the EU last year.
"We are people who believe that the United Kingdom should leave, should leave as a whole, and that is not happening," said DUP MP Sammy Wilson.
A further 20 million people in England will join the toughest tier of Covid restrictions from Thursday.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock told MPs the Midlands, North East, parts of the North West and parts of the South West are among those escalated to tier four.
Earlier, the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine was approved for use in the UK, with the first doses to be given on Monday.
But the PM warned that people should not "in any way think that this is over" as "the virus is really surging".
A further 50,023 new Covid cases were recorded in the UK on Wednesday, as well as 981 more deaths within 28 days of a positive test - more than double Tuesday's total.
Under tier four rules non-essential shops, beauty salons and hairdressers must close, and people are limited to meeting in a public outdoor place with their household, or one other person.
Mr Hancock also said that rising cases across England mean it is "therefore necessary to apply tier three measures more broadly too, including in Liverpool and North Yorkshire".
In tier three areas, household mixing is banned indoors and in private gardens, while the rule of six applies in public spaces. Shops, gyms and personal care services can remain open, but hospitality settings must close except for takeaway.
All of the tier changes will come into effect at 00:01 GMT on Thursday 31 December.
Speaking to the BBC earlier, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that 60% of UK coronavirus cases were now the new, more transmissible, strain of Covid-19.
Asked by political editor Laura Kuenssberg if the government had been too slow to act, he said: "What we, unfortunately, were not able to budget for was this this new variant."
He added: "It's spreading rapidly from the places where it's started, in the east of London and in Kent. And, alas, it's starting to seed across the country."
The areas joining tier four from Thursday are:
Leicester City
Leicestershire (Oadby and Wigston, Harborough, Hinckley and Bosworth, Blaby, Charnwood, North West Leicestershire, Melton)
Lincolnshire (City of Lincoln, Boston, South Kesteven, West Lindsey, North Kesteven, South Holland, East Lindsey)
Northamptonshire (Corby, Daventry, East Northamptonshire, Kettering, Northampton, South Northamptonshire, Wellingborough)
Derby and Derbyshire (Derby, Amber Valley, South Derbyshire, Bolsover, North East Derbyshire, Chesterfield, Erewash, Derbyshire Dales, High Peak)
Nottingham and Nottinghamshire (Gedling, Ashfield, Mansfield, Rushcliffe, Bassetlaw, Newark and Sherwood, Nottinghamshire, Broxtowe)
Birmingham and Black Country (Dudley, Birmingham, Sandwell, Walsall, Wolverhampton)
Coventry
Solihull
Warwickshire (Rugby, Nuneaton and Bedworth, Warwick, North Warwickshire, Stratford-upon-Avon)
Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent (East Staffordshire, Stafford, South Staffordshire, Cannock Chase, Lichfield, Staffordshire Moorlands, Newcastle under Lyme, Tamworth, Stoke-on-Trent)
Lancashire (Burnley, Pendle, Blackburn with Darwen, Ribble Valley, Blackpool, Preston, Hyndburn, Chorley, Fylde, Lancaster, Rossendale, South Ribble, West Lancashire, Wyre)
Cheshire and Warrington (Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Warrington)
Cumbria (Eden, Carlisle, South Lakeland, Barrow-in-Furness, Copeland, Allerdale)
Tees Valley (Darlington, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, Stockton-on-Tees )
North East (County Durham, Gateshead, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, North Tyneside, Northumberland, South Tyneside, Sunderland)
Gloucestershire (Gloucester, Forest of Dean, Cotswolds, Tewkesbury, Stroud, Cheltenham)
Somerset Council (Mendip, Sedgemoor, Somerset West and Taunton, South Somerset)
Swindon
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
Isle of Wight
New Forest
The areas joining tier three are:
Rutland
Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin
Worcestershire (Bromsgrove, Malvern Hills, Redditch, Worcester, Wychavon, Wyre Forest)
Herefordshire
Liverpool City Region (Halton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Sefton, Wirral, St Helens)
York & North Yorkshire (Scarborough, Hambleton, Richmondshire, Selby, Craven, Ryedale, Harrogate, City of York)
Bath and North East Somerset
Devon, Plymouth, Torbay (East Devon, Exeter, Mid Devon, North Devon, South Hams, Teignbridge, Torridge, West Devon, Plymouth, Torbay)
Cornwall
Dorset
Wiltshire
Announcing the rule changes, Mr Hancock said: "I know that tier three and four measures place a significant burden on people, and especially on businesses affected, but I am afraid it is absolutely necessary because of the number of cases that we've seen."
Labour shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said people across England "will be deeply worried" that they have now been "in a form of restriction for months and months and months".
"It's having a huge impact on families and small businesses," he added.
Meanwhile, a statement on behalf of nine council and other leaders in the north-east of England urged the government to replace its regional approach with a national lockdown "to ensure the spread of the new variant is slowed and efforts can be focused on the crucial roll-out of the vaccine".
"This is a national problem and a national solution is required now," they added.
The approval of the Oxford vaccine - of which the UK has ordered 100 million doses - means vaccination centres will now start inviting patients to receive the first of their two doses from next week.
Priority groups for immunisation have already been identified, starting with care home residents, the over-80s, and health and care workers.
The health secretary told the Commons the UK already has 530,000 doses available from Monday, "with millions due from AstraZeneca by the beginning of February".
He added that the "clinical advice is that the Oxford vaccine is best deployed as two doses up to 12 weeks apart"
MPs have overwhelmingly approved the Brexit trade deal to pave the way for the UK-EU agreement to come into force at 11pm tomorrow.
The House of Commons backed the agreement, struck between Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the EU on Christmas Eve, by 521 votes to 73 - a majority of 448.
The deal, which stretches to 1,246 pages and covers £660bn worth of trade, will now pass to the House of Lords to be considered by peers.
Image:The PM's signature on the Brexit trade agreement
The government is hoping the agreement will pass through all of its required parliamentary stages in a single day on Wednesday.
And, therefore, it will be fully ratified ahead of the end of the Brexit transition period at 11pm on New Year's Eve.
Advertisement
Little more than an hour after the vote, Mr Johnson added his formal signature to the EU-UK trade deal in Downing Street.
"The treaty that I've just signed is not the end, it is a new beginning and I think the beginning of what will be a wonderful relationship between the UK and our friends and partners in the EU," he said.
More from Boris Johnson
The documents had been flown to London by RAF plane after being signed by European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels on Wednesday morning.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
PM on Brexit: We have nothing to fear
The prime minister earlier told MPs the deal would allow the UK to take control of its "national destiny".
"The central purpose of this bill is to accomplish something that the British people always knew in their hearts could be done but which we were continually told was impossible," he said.
"We were told we could not have our cake and eat it... namely that we could trade and cooperate with our European neighbours on the closest terms of friendship and goodwill, whilst retaining sovereign control of our laws and our national destiny."
Mr Johnson hailed the deal as allowing "a new relationship between Britain and the EU as sovereign equals".
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer had ordered his party to vote in favour of the deal, arguing the alternative would be for the UK to leave the Brexit transition period without a EU trade agreement in place.
In a message to those MPs who planned to vote against the deal - including some within his own party - he said: "When the default is no deal it's not a mark of how pro-European you are to reject implementing this treaty.
"It isn't in the national interest to duck a question or to hide in the knowledge that others will save you from the consequences of your own vote."
Sir Keir said the agreement would "put in place a floor from which we can build a strong future relationship with the EU".
However, the Labour leader criticised the "thin deal" as having "many flaws" and said there was a "gaping hole" in the agreement's provisions for the services sector.
Image:Boris Johnson arrives back at 10 Downing Street after voting on the Brexit trade deal in the House of Commons
One Labour MP, Bell Ribeiro-Addy, voted against the deal while 36 other Labour MPs recorded no vote.
This suggested they had abstained and so also rebelled against party leader Sir Keir by failing to back the EU trade deal.
Among those was Helen Hayes, who resigned her shadow cabinet role after choosing not to support Labour's official position.
Two Conservative former cabinet ministers, Brexiteers Owen Paterson and John Redwood, also both abstained to rebel against the prime minister.
During the more than four hours' debate on the deal, former prime minister Theresa May took Sir Keir to task for failing to back her efforts in negotiating with the EU last year, when he was shadow Brexit secretary.
She told the now Labour leader: "He said he wanted a better deal - he had the opportunity in early 2019 when there was the opportunity of a better deal on the table and he voted against it."
Mrs May welcomed Mr Johnson's agreement, but suggested Brussels would be favoured under the terms of the deal.
"We have a deal in trade that benefits the EU, but not a deal in services that would have benefited the UK," she added.
Senior Conservative eurosceptic Sir Bill Cash compared the prime minister to both Ancient Greek statesman Pericles and Alexander the Great, adding Mr Johnson had "saved our democracy".
His fellow Tory MP Mark Francois, who chairs the European Research Group of Conservative Brexiteers, claimed he and his other Leave-supporting "Spartans" could now "lower our spears" in the "battle for Brexit".
SNP, Plaid Cymru and Liberal Democrat MPs voted against the agreement.
And the DUP also voted against the deal after reiterating their anger at the post-Brexit arrangements for the Irish border - known as the Northern Ireland Protocol - that Mr Johnson signed up to with the EU last year.
"We are people who believe that the United Kingdom should leave, should leave as a whole, and that is not happening," said DUP MP Sammy Wilson.
