Southend's devastating Covid death toll: Councillor lost 11 loved ones

The debate was held at the full council meeting as the latest data revealed the town is the sixth worst in the UK for Covid deaths.

The town has faced 582 fatalities, a rate of 317.8 Covid deaths per 100,000 people.

Trevor Harp, councillor for health and adult social care, says he too has felt the devastating blow of the virus first-hand, having lost 11 loved ones since the start of the pandemic.

Besides being close to Kent - where the fast-spreading variant started - Mr Harp says other potential reasons behind such a loss include the number of care homes in the town and the ability of the local NHS to respond to surge demand and intensive care beds.

Mr Harp said: “As well as this, in certain parts of the town we have higher rates of asthma and COPD.

“It’s also well known that income and where you live all goes towards people’s general health too. So having large areas of disadvantaged communities plays a role here.

“Obviously we have also got an age demographic which has more elderly than a lot of average towns, along with a high number of residential homes. The people in these homes are often more vulnerable, and once the infection is in it’s very difficult to control.

“We had more care home deaths in January to March this year than we did in the whole of last year.

“And we are also in close proximity with Kent, which is where the new variant started. The majority of our cases were that variant at one point.”

Deputy council leader Ron Woodley says he can also relate after having lost one of his closest friends of more than 26 years.

He added: “I really do feel for those affected and I can understand it, I’ve been through it myself. My friend was more like a brother to me than anything, and I miss him terribly.

“Like others will have found, it is going to take me some time to get over this. He was so close to me. It is really heartbreaking for every single person that has lost someone.”